Autoguiding Cable Problem

[adamsp123]

A while back I was having problems with the DEC calibration in PHD, the first time this happened the DEC calibration routine lost control when trying to cal South, the mount would run away North.

I had discovered that I had a serious inbalance when my Newtonian was vertical, it wanted to tip over to the near horizontal in DEC due to the camera weight being in the wrong position.

Next, which for a long time had me baffled and seriously frustrated was the complete inability of PHD to make any calibration movement in DEC!

What I found was the ST4 cable from the Guidecam (QHY5) to the starbook controller of my Vixen mount has some play in the connector at either end ie you can push/pull the cable end and it will move back and forth in the camera/starbook socket, I found if it was not pushed fully in on either the Cam or controller, DEC pulses where not being transmitted to the mount, funnily it always works OK in RA??!!

So if you ever have a situation where DEC calibration will not work check the ST4 cable is pushed firmly into the socket at each end.

[Psychobilly]

Hi Pete,,

If your using PHDGuide there an option in the tools menu to "manual Guide" this gives you a vitrual handbox and can be used to cherck that the mount is responding to guide signals properly.

If you using a GP-USB interface (which you aren't) there a a few utils you can download to check that its working properly as well...

I would suspect most guiding software will have an option somewhere for manually driving the mount for checking the system out...

Billy...

[adamsp123]

I wish Billy I had looked more into PHD and spotted the manual guide, I thought it was an inbalance thing again but now if I see the calibration taking too long to clear the backlash before DEC calibration I know exactly what to do, now I always push the ST4 connector fully home before starting PHD.