All Sorts of Issues but a Good Night Anyway.

[xa-coupe (Jeff)]

Tonight I got a long way towards a good alignment. I took my time, I chose stars I knew and I didn't have to assume a Karma Sutra pose to see through the finder scope (angled scope on it's way, I've had enough) and was working my way to a really decent alignment. Then As I tried to close in on it to get the error 30 arc seconds or under (got Az to 17 at one point) it started to open up again, particularly the altitude.


After a while, no matter how many times I adjusted the altitude, it was always off by a significant amount. I'd run a 2 star alignment, get it right, polar align with barely any adjustment ... then run a 2 star alignment again to check and the original error was back.


I tried a couple of test exposures at 30 secs and they weren't too bad (90x900fl refractor) so I took out the handset and plugged in the EQMOD cable.



Given a decent (for me) alignment, I decided to wire up the guide scope, get everything started up to see what happens. Of course, the guiding goes mental but in my defence, the total error is down from 2800+ to around 28. Forcing calibration ended up with an message about it is probably a dodgey calibration due to insufficient steps. Gave up on the guiding at that stage.



The real surprise was the EQMOD software. It kept of dropping sidereal tracking to 'not tracking' from randomly and occasionally locking up.. and parking itself randomly, nowhere near the parking position. I was saved by the camera battery going flat... I had to pack up then.



I do suspect there's something squirly with the mount. I have changed pretty well everything other than the mount and yet I still have strange issues. Is there a way of running it through a test sequence to see what pops out? EQ6 Pro.



Funnily enough, even with the problems and no real images from the night, I feel like I've got somewhere and had a good time. The moon, Jupiter and Saturn in a line, it was cool but not cold and generally a nice evening.

[jahnpahwa (JP)]

Good onya, Jeff. Keep tapping away mate. Good sign that you're having a good time without everything going right!

[xa-coupe (Jeff)]

Progress for those very few that are interested. Also,it may help for those with similar problems searching for answers.



Tonight was almost all win. I got the thing aligned well enough to start collecting data, with the Lagoon Nebula as something new to try. I didn't use the USB hub for anything except the camera .. this was the win. Guiding worked (see caveat further on) pretty well, within what others say are acceptable limits anyway.



What wasn't win was the EQMOD dropping out sidereal tracking at random intervals. It was at least guiding well enough until the dropouts. Whilst data is accumulating I've found some ideas to look at tomorrow.


Recreating, or creating a PEC file and turn off mount limits in EQMOD are the things to look at, and if that doesn't work, I have a spare cable.



Still not able to get the Alt right during polar alignment. Az is now down to 13 arc seconds but Dec is over a minute. I was hoping guiding would compensate for that. Following the list Star Trek ( Martin) gave me stopped my ad libbing of things and it all started to come together. Hopefully a picture worthy of posting up will come from tonight.


Getting there finally... and it is a nice night out....

[Crater101 (Warren)]

Sometimes just getting out there is half the battle. I think we've all of us at some time had moments where you're not just subject to Murphy's Law, but you start to think Murphy was an optimist...


It's always tempting to pack up and head back to the car / hotel / lounge room / pub / whatever. But even if you're not getting it right, you ARE getting used to doing things with your gear under the same conditions you'll be in when you do want it to go well. Night, winds, making adjustments just with a headtorch...it all goes together to give you a bit more experience than you had before. And that means when it all does go well, it makes it a really good night. And those nights are what make it all worthwhile.