Quote:
Originally Posted by g__day
Lee,
I waited about 3 months - from memory the main hold up was sourcing the motors from Italy - then when they finally arrived they shipped them to Australia rather then flew them! Sirius have set order times each week or month - ask them when their next order goes in and place your order a few days before their order dates to minimise wait times.
How do you plan to get comms to the observatory if its 350 metres away from your house - that's a bit far to run cat6 cable without a repeater or two isn't it? Still once you have power and IP signal going to your observatory - and it all mounted up and tuned - you'll be amazed how much time you save!
Another pointer is a lot of gear may still require serial cables (focusers, some mounts, the Maxdome kit) etc. This means you have to consider either get an older PC or 1 or 2 PCI adapter boards that each have 2-4 serial connectors (e.g Sunnix), or get a really high quality USB2 to 4 port Serial hub - like the kind Peter Ward uses in his obs (NPort). The cheap ones are notiorously bad on geting the serial cable to work - their chipset isn't somehow completely reliable with signalling required.
I would from experience now suggest run say 4m USB3 cable from Astrolab PC to your pier - and place a powered 7 port USB3 / 2 hub on your pier - this makes cabling much simpler than trying to have 15 cables going from your gear back to your PC! I also run power to a 5 port surge protected board board which I sticky velcro to the pier - so all signal and mains power is available mide way up the pier.
Lastly a dehumidifer (Kogan), timer switches, and surge protection and a decent earth are all good ideas. I use an Online (not back up or stand-by) UPS and put serial surge protectors on all the serial cables (the kind petrol stations use to link their pumps to the cash registers). I run the mount of a Lab power supply and place both it and the UPS and other sensitive electronics in a plastic box - just to minimise the chance of rain hitting it whilst the dome is open in case I miss the start of a brief rain storm.
Good luck!
Matthew
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Thanks Matthew, appreciate all the advice!
I'm planning to use a couple of long range wireless access points for comms. Been having some issues but I think that might be related to the computer using 2.4Ghz wifi and interference with the ASI 1600 which is USB 3. Should be able to sort that out ok.
I don't have mains power up there so everything is currently, and will continue to be, running off a series of batteries hooked up to a solar panel.
Not sure what I'm going to do about switching the devices on and off yet. Mount hub pro looked interesting, but it only has 3-4 USB ports, and apparently it can bug out depending on whether the computer or the hub is powered first, which might be difficult to control. I found another IP power switch that I think has ASCOM support but that was "just that" and from memory $395US + shipping.
I got the final quote from Sirius today and it's a lot more costly than expected: $10,099 + postage + handling + insurance for the dome rotation kit, shutter (replacement shutter + motors etc) kit, and the maxdome system. That's waaaaay out of the budget, so I'm going to be looking into some DIY options.
Thinking about trying to mount an Intel NUC to the scope to control everything.
Quote:
Originally Posted by strongmanmike
Well Lee, that doesn't look to dissimilar to how mine looked when I picked it up in late 2012 from someones backyard. Mine is circa 1996 and my approach when I got it was to... do absolutely no cleaning at all  Mine rotates ok although it does have one slight sticking point that could play havoc with a motorised system?...I'm manual push to though 
Personally when I ever get around to cleaning mine I recon good'ol warm soapy water and rinse off with a garden hose would be perfectly adequate
Of course after the good clean, a close inspection of the fibre glass should tell you pretty quickly if it is going to crack and leak, or not..?
Good luck with the project
Mike |
hah, I like your approach Mike! I was mostly worried that it would need maintenance or start to fall apart on me. I know nothing about maintaining fibreglass. I'll give the thing a good clean and then see how it looks before deciding whether to paint or gel coat it.
Quote:
Originally Posted by leon
Lee, after all that good advice and other ways of fixing the problem, I'm sure a good scrub will bring it back to life.
You saved a heap on a new one, enjoy. 
Leon  |
Thanks Leon! Sure did save a bunch compared to a new one
