#1  
Old 11-10-2012, 01:00 PM
5ash's Avatar
5ash (Philip)
Earthling

5ash is offline
 
Join Date: Mar 2005
Location: Hunter valley. nsw
Posts: 1,111
taking unguided pictures with an NEQ6

How long has anyone achieved unguided pictures with an unmodified NEQ6? I quite by accident discovered i could take pictures through my ED80 mounted on the NEQ6 for exposures in excess of 3minutes unguided . About 30% show elongation of stars but the rest are fine. Below are two pictures taken at 195sec exposures . The helix is made up of 10 frames at 3min 15sec each and NGC253 7 frames of 3min 15 sec each , darks, flats and biases used. I haven't tried longer exposures yet , the 3min 15sec happened to be the time i found by accident .camera was an NEX5 working at 14 megapixels
philip
Attached Thumbnails
Click for full-size image (Helix nebula iso 1600 exp195s x10, 32m30sproc hpmk2.jpg)
176.2 KB121 views
Click for full-size image (NGC253 195sec iso 800 7frms autowb lvls hue.jpg)
190.6 KB128 views
Reply With Quote
  #2  
Old 11-10-2012, 05:48 PM
Sarge's Avatar
Sarge (Rod)
Registered User

Sarge is offline
 
Join Date: Mar 2009
Location: Melbourne, Vic
Posts: 465
Well done Phillip. Your alignment would have to be spot on for 3 min unguided. I've tried up to 40 secs with fair to good results. I am going to try for 90 secs shortly (if Melb ever gets another clear night!), but will spend some considerable time and effort to ensure polar alignment is as close as I can get.

Clear skies

Rod
Reply With Quote
  #3  
Old 11-10-2012, 06:14 PM
multiweb's Avatar
multiweb (Marc)
ze frogginator

multiweb is offline
 
Join Date: Oct 2007
Location: Sydney
Posts: 22,060
Pretty awesome. I don't think I ever got over 1min unguided.
Reply With Quote
  #4  
Old 11-10-2012, 06:28 PM
stardust steve's Avatar
stardust steve (Steve)
Registered User

stardust steve is offline
 
Join Date: Sep 2010
Location: Adelaide
Posts: 779
Great effort, like Rod said spot on. I am yet to crack 30sec with the ED80 and EQ3. I will soon though, i can feel it in my bones
Reply With Quote
  #5  
Old 11-10-2012, 08:38 PM
5ash's Avatar
5ash (Philip)
Earthling

5ash is offline
 
Join Date: Mar 2005
Location: Hunter valley. nsw
Posts: 1,111
Thanks for the replies, my neq6 is mounted permanently in a "Heath robinson"
Observatory that grew from an observing enclosure. I drift aligned 12months ago using the c9.25" and a g star camera . I am suprised the alignment is so good and the neq6 is tracking so well. Pec error will limit my exposures in the end.

Regards Philip
Reply With Quote
  #6  
Old 12-10-2012, 12:07 AM
jjjnettie's Avatar
jjjnettie (Jeanette)
Registered User

jjjnettie is offline
 
Join Date: Feb 2005
Location: Monto
Posts: 16,738
Congratulations.
I think this is the reason I like imaging wide fields through the camera lens. You can get the long exposures without the guiding. It's makes the whole experience so much more pleasurable not having to play nurse maid to to computers and software.
Reply With Quote
  #7  
Old 15-10-2012, 10:12 PM
5ash's Avatar
5ash (Philip)
Earthling

5ash is offline
 
Join Date: Mar 2005
Location: Hunter valley. nsw
Posts: 1,111
I tried 3.5minutes unguided tonight and managed 17 out of 24 that had definite round stars when magnified. Also saw no evidence of any periodicity in the distribution of good and not so good frames which was odd as I expected the good or bad ones to show a regular distribution over the hour and three quarters the exposures were made. I have not done any pec training!
Philip
Reply With Quote
  #8  
Old 16-10-2012, 08:33 AM
ZeroID's Avatar
ZeroID (Brent)
Lost in Space ....

ZeroID is offline
 
Join Date: May 2010
Location: Auckland, NZ
Posts: 4,949
I'm up at 1 minute unguided through an 80mm f5 on an EQ6 with about 60-70% success rate on round stars. Taken a while to get the last little tweak in for SCP though.
Reply With Quote
  #9  
Old 20-10-2012, 10:30 PM
5ash's Avatar
5ash (Philip)
Earthling

5ash is offline
 
Join Date: Mar 2005
Location: Hunter valley. nsw
Posts: 1,111
Tried again tonight , 39 degrees here today but went down below 20 degrees By sunset, took ten 4 minute exposures before the clouds got too thick. Managed to get 5 out of 10 with perfectly round stars . Conditions were only useful to continue test of what's capable with an ed80 unguided on an NEQ6.
Philip
Reply With Quote
Reply

Bookmarks

Thread Tools
Rate This Thread
Rate This Thread:

Posting Rules
You may not post new threads
You may not post replies
You may not post attachments
You may not edit your posts

BB code is On
Smilies are On
[IMG] code is On
HTML code is Off

Forum Jump


All times are GMT +10. The time is now 02:50 AM.

Powered by vBulletin Version 3.8.7 | Copyright ©2000 - 2024, Jelsoft Enterprises Ltd.
Advertisement
Testar
Advertisement
Bintel
Advertisement