lukepower

Hi fellow astronomers You might have noticed it, finally I have been able to put my system under full load recently, after some issues with - well, moreless everything Anyway, I am wondering if anybody used Sequence to image comets or asteroids. I am talking about imaging a longer run, and am quite sure that RA/DEC values alone might not be enough... Maybe this would would be something for a wish-list? What do you think?

Hi christian, heh, I understand. I found out that the ambient temperature is the key, you would have to tweak the settings on a clear day so that you get the correct reading. Then, wait for a slightly cloudy day (haze or the like), and tweak again to get the correct readings. It's a longer task, but doable

Hi Christian, sure, but beware that I found out you have to tune it to your specific needs. I have to switch from "Summer" to "Winter" settings - the colder weather in winter would otherwise trick the software to think it's always sunny... K1: 33 ; K2: 0 ; K3: 41; K4: 100 ; K5: 105; K6: 10; K7: 0 Hope it helps

Great to hear! But mind that sequence is beta and it looks to me that weather safety is only checked during an automated sequence run (and not before or after....). Glad I could help.

Antonio, If it works, then the small button located on the bottom left of sequence window should actually change text (from"OK" to "unsafe"), so... I don't know, maybe Philipp sent me a newer version....

I also use 7.20,and saw some delay between a change to unsafe and Sequence showing it. By the way, sequence is still not perfect in that regard, as it only reacts to unsafe weather during a sequence run. In the wait time before and afterward it stays there doing nothing, not good if rain comes in. I also sent Jaime the source code, so maybe he finds something...

Ah well, drivers... Good to hear you nailed the problem. I also was strugglin with an updated driver for a Logitech Webcam I used to check the scope position from remote. It constantly causes a BSOD (blue screen of death) after about an hour of use, and only a reboot helps... Funny enough, as long as I don't start the webcam software all is fine. But hey, who cares

Hi Prefetch, the balance indeed is very important. AFAIK, you are supposed to make your pointing model with the exact setup you are going to use afterwards for imaging, so no camera/corrector/whatever change permitted. It's not only about the balancing, it's about the model: As soon as you change something in the geometry of the telescope sitting on the mount (like, moving it on the connecting plate) the pointing would be changed. Same could happen if you change the imaging train (in a perfect world it wouldn't...). And the balance, well, ASA told me more than once I need to balance spot-on, especially with a heavy setup... ANyway, if it is not working I would suggest to contact ASA's support and schedule a remote session. They are quick in finding the common causes

Hi Antonio, could you try to download one of the VBScript examples from here and run it? http://www.aagware.eu/aag_cloudwatcherexamples.htm They are basically trying to run CloudWatcher as I do with my wrapper...

Hehe Roger, your prophecy on the electronics were right I think that the swap itself made probabily not a big change, except maybe that the balance could actually change ins ome unusual attitudes, depending on the tube diameter, but that's just a guess. Honestly I think that the rigidity of the tripod and mount-tube combination are essential. I once tried the system with a loosened pier, man that was a funny sound in the observatory No way to get those vibrations out of the system.

Hrm... Antonio, could I login on your computer via team viewer or similar? I want to find out why it's not working...

Antonio, alright, back on the PC (instead of the tablet) life is easier What I noticed when I ran it the first time was that CloudWatcher kept trying to connect, and the number of "Active users" was running high and low like a very fast counter. I then killed both CloudWatcher and Sequence and started from scratch, and it suddenly worked. Don't ask me why as I don't know ...

Hrm, could you make a screenshot? I have an idea what could be wrong. Is it showing a normal number of connected clients (like 2), or does the number changes very quickly?

Prefetch, A stable pier/tripod is essential But anyway, i would try to make everything stiff and a bigger (= over a wider Area of the sky) pointing model...

Antonio, Is Cloudwatcher working correctly if you start it alone and start reading?

Polar error altitude/azimuth refer to your polar alignment! The rms values on the other hand specify how good the calculated model is (lower is better). Autoslew calculates a multitude of errors like collimation, flexure and so on, so cool

HI Prefetch, my first guess would be two-fold: Increase the coverage of your pointing file (seems relatively small to me), and make sure everything on the mount is firmly fixed (all screws tightened). ANd make sure you do not have any mirrors moving or similar. I would also check the PID settings of the motors, if they are not well-tuned the mount can "dance" around the target coordinates depending on where in the sky it is pointing...

ALright Antonio, I re-checked with a second computer, it looks like what is needed to run it is: AAGWare CloudWatcher ASCOM 6.1 ASCOM 6.1 Developer tools This should do the trick, please give it a try. I wish I could easily make a installation package, but I don't have the appropriate software for that... Update: Tried to put together an easy installation here: http://www.astro-dolomites.com/public/downloads/setup.exe Right now it only registers the component, so probabily some files are still missing...

Hi Antonio, hrm, good question. I would guess that it needs the latest .NET Framework, as I compiled it against NET 4.0. Would at least make sense to me. And yes, I was also testing the new Sequence version and found that CloudWatcher wasn't able to provide the interface, so I quickly built one. I also forwarded the code to AAGWare, they told me they will work on it in a few weeks... Btw, I used it last night and it worked perfectly I would work on some sort of installer, but really... Hope it works without.

Hi BIll, I checked the corrector and it looks alright. Especially from the back (where the camera is mounted) everything is nicely black. From the front there are two very tiny white rings to be seen, probabily where the lenses are fixed in the casing. My father helped me out yesterday to apply some velours (black of course) on the inside of the baffle tube, as well as on part of the secondary baffle. I then took a few images through slight clouds, judge by yourself: I am quite happy now

Hi Gerald, oops, had to upload it somewhere: http://www.astro-dolomites.com/public/downloads/ASCOM.AAGWare.SafetyMonitor.dll

Hi Bill, I will check the corrector today, as I am dismantling the back of the scope to apply some velours on the inside of the baffle tube. It is definitively very shiny, so this should have some sort of impact. The Scope design I have has basically a hole in the primary (like on a schmidt-cassegrain), where the lights comes back from the secondary towards the camera. I can exchange the secondary ( I have a total of three), effectively changing the focal ratio (between f/9 and f/20 in Cassegrain mode) or even making a Newton out of it (coming to f/3). I never tried that so far, though... Thanks Bill

Hi, Philipp Keller added some support for weather safety in Sequence, but he used a pretty new ASCOM interface: SafetyMonitor. It seems that there are no drivers around, so I coded a wrapper which is working at least with AAGWare CloudWatcher, Warning: It is a very simple piece of code, it might have some bugs in it, and thus I cannot give a warranty that it is safe to use. But at least in my observatory it's running. So, to install it you need: The file, "ASCOM.AAGWare.SafetyMonitor.dll", place it in a decent location (like "C:\Astronomy") Open a command prompt as Administrator (cmd.exe) and run: regasm ASCOM.AAGWare.SafetyMonitor.dll (regasm.exe should be part of the .NET framework) Afterwards one can choose it among the SafetyMonitors.

Hi Bill, good idea. Till now I identified some screws and the inside of the baffle tube being shiny, so I'll start with them. The corrector is from ASA; so hopefully they did a good job and it's ok Anyway, I had the pleasure of using Sequence last night for a night-long session, and it ran flawlessy. For the first time I was also able to command the roll-off roof, so that it both opened at the beginning and closed at the end of the night. Best regards

Alright folks, after some more fiddling at least the collimation seems better: As for the reflections, the baffle tube of the primary seems shiny on the inside, so I'm gonna work on that for now.