Quote:
Originally Posted by LewisM
Honestly, which is going to be the better system - a Lodestar through a PERFECT Takahashi finder (modified by me into a guidescope) solidly mounted on top (no flexure - I used Borg tube rings with a small aluminium custom milled set of spacers for a perfect fit), or the self guiding chip in the SBIG ST-8XE (which is now admittedly an OLD scope, but still fantastic in my opinion).
Is the chip on the ST-8XE sensitive enough to see well? I am thinking it may not be as sensitive as the Lodestar.
Seeing we still have horrendous cloud up here on the "Sunshine" Coast, got lots of time to sort things out.
Image of the current rig with the rigidly mounted guidescope arrangement (and the custom made light cone I had made to fit the 4" drawtube  ) |
Lodestar and 237guider chips should be roughly similar in performance (similar pixel size/count and QE) - looks like the 237 is an oldy, but a goody.
An in-camera guider will not have any flex, so would be the better solution for broadband. For narrowband, the filters will vastly reduce the in-camera guider signal, so an external guider or OAG would probably be be better. The optical quality of the guide scope has almost no effect on performance - GSO ones work fine. Lodestar wins the guider sensitivity race by using big pixels - this is great for OAG or a long fl guidescope, but high QE guide cameras with smaller pixels may possibly be better alternatives for a small guidescope.