Autoguider (SS Autoguider) focus

[Ian Robinson]

I am getting very close to building my roll off roof shed and installing my steel pier and Atlux in their permanent homes.

Have a question related to getting my StarShoot Autoguider properly focused.
How do you guys focus your autoguiders (SS, ST4, what have you) at the start of an automated imaging session when setting up for the night ?

Will be handy to have some options other than this ( STI AutoGuider Focuser at http://www.stellar-international.com/index1.html ), it looks like a very good product and something worth having since I have no view finding eyepiece that is parfocal with my SS Autoguider at this time.
I will also have a use for this or something similar when I rebirth my old non-GoTo CG5 by adding an ST4 interface (rj12) to it (it become my travel / knock about camera platform , plenty of life in the old CG5 yet , and it's still a handy GEM.)

[Gama]

Just use your guiding software. As it takes images, focus it.
With PHD, just set up the exposure time, and start the imaging cycle till the star looks like a dot. Then leave the focus alone, and move to the next step and start the guider calibration step, etc..

Theo

[g__day (Matthew)]

I focused my guider using a Bhatinov mask and Jupiter (as I'm using an Off Axis Guider) so I needed a large bright object to get an interference pattern that was bright enough to use.

[Merlin66 (Ken)]

In AstroArt, you can analyse the star image to get the smallest FWHM image for precise focus. Many other packages do the same!

[Ian Robinson]

Originally Posted by g__day

I focused my guider using a Bhatinov mask and Jupiter (as I'm using an Off Axis Guider) so I needed a large bright object to get an interference pattern that was bright enough to use.

Will be using my Lumicon 2" Esyguider with my 10" f4.66 newt for primefocus imaging when I get it back together, but don't have a Bhartinov mask.

For my wide angle imaging it'll be either my modded CG5 and my old 1960s vintage Tasco 60mm for a guidescope (sidebyside). So looking at a STI AutoGuider Focuser or similar for that which is parfocal with the guider's CCD chip.

Not particularly interested in focusing via the computer screen - my crayford is not motorised or connectable to a computer and I want to keep my set up as simple as possible , I hold to the KISS philosophy in most things.