ASA DDM85 Premium

[TimC]

Hi,

 

I have just received my ASA DDM85 Premium mount. It will carry a Keller 500mm Classical Cassegrain OTA. I have never used a bent pier before, so I am excited to see how well this system works for avoiding meridian flips. I see settings in Autoslew for setting limits: How far can you go through the meridian, minimum flip distance for east side slews......can you tell me what would be reasonable starting points for these settings??  I am in the Southern Hemishpere (Australia), so are there any settings to watch out for with respect to southern hemisphere operation? For instance, when the manual says point the OTA to the North to make a pointing map or such thing, I assume I should point South in these situations??

 

The mount is very impressive sitting on the amazing  bent pier. I hope we set the base plate close enough to the correct orientation to the south pole, as the amount of azimuth adjustment available on the pier itself, seems quite small. I guess I will find out soon when I do my first polar alignment routine.

 

Many thanks,

Tim

[Gerald]

Hello Tim,

 

Check at mount flip options - stay on side. At limits "how far can ..." use 90 and increase or decrease the value after trials because this value depends on the geographic latitude. As soon as you checked stay on side the minimum flip distance has no influence any more you can leave the value as default.

 

best regards

 

Gerald

[TimC]

Hi Gerald,

 

Thanks very much. I am finding that I cannot connect to TheSkyX. I get an error 206 in TheSkyX and the mount does not connect. I am using the latest version of TheSkyX 10.2.0 (build 6409). I am using Win XP Pro SP3 and have .net 3.5 installed. I wonder if I should ask ASA to remote connect to the mount in the next day or so, as I will be out at the remote site over the next few days where the mount is....??

Best Regards,

Tim

[Gerald]

Hi Tim,

 

Should be the best in this case.

 

Best regards

 

Gerald

[TimC]

Hi,

 

I have just been reading the Sequence manual and I am wondering with the DDM85 PREMIUM mount using of course the bent pier, whether I should use the "Equatorial German" setting or the "Equatorial Fork" option as I see you state the DDM160 should use the Eq. Fork  setting....??

 

 

Mount type

For the DDM85 and DDM60 you should set this parameter

to „Equatorial German“, for the DDM160 set the

parameter to "Equatorial Fork".

 

 

Please advise.

 

Many thanks,

Tim

[TimC]

Hi,

 

Does anyone know the answer to my question from a few days ago?? Please see my post of 19th May,..... thanks.

 

Regards,

Tim

[GerhardB]

Hi Tim,

 

Because you use the mount like a DPM160, I would expect that the 'Equatorial Fork'

-configuration is the right one.

 

Best regards,

Gerhard

[TimC]

Thanks Gerhard!!

[P.Keller]

Hi Gerald,

 

Thanks very much. I am finding that I cannot connect to TheSkyX. I get an error 206 in TheSkyX and the mount does not connect. I am using the latest version of TheSkyX 10.2.0 (build 6409). I am using Win XP Pro SP3 and have .net 3.5 installed. I wonder if I should ask ASA to remote connect to the mount in the next day or so, as I will be out at the remote site over the next few days where the mount is....??

Best Regards,

Tim

 

you have to connet through the POTH or Ascom Hub.

Don't connect directly to AstrooptikServerTelescope but select first the Hub and then inside the Hub, select AstrooptikServerTelescope

[TimC]

Hi Philipp,

 

Thanks very much for the advice. I will see if using POTH is more stable.

 

Regards,

Tim

[BrunoFontaine]

Hi,

 

I have just ordered an ASA DDM85 Premium mount.

Building the observatory, I have to position the pier basement  relative to the center of the observatory.

Asking details and support to the vendor, he sent me a drawing of the target configuration (configuration A)

I don't understand this drawing because the RA axis is not aligned with the celestial pole axis, and it supposes that the RA axis is on the upper part of the mount.

To my understanding,  the configuration of the mount should be configuration B, with the RA axis aligned with polar axis

After several exchanges, the vendor still confirms that the correct mounting must be as in A 

Is somebody able to decide who is right and why  

 

Here are the two configurations :

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Configurations cibles.pdf

[nakbrooks]

I assume you are in the northern hemisphere? A is definitely correct (how would you point the OTA at the pole with B?).

 

Nigel

[lukepower]

Hi,

 

well, I think both A and B are not completely correct in terms of what is written... "Axe Pôle Nord" is definitively wrong how it is written there, but the remainder is correct. The orange line pointing South is of course not pointing to Polaris (how could that be?), but pointing South. The scope, as it is drawn on "A" is right now pointing to Polaris.

 

COnsidering the (original) drawing of "B", that is also correct, this time with the axis pointing to Polaris drawn in the right direction. It looks like a side view to me... It should be really simple: The second, upper part of the bend pier shall point to polaris

[nakbrooks]

Agreed. I have exactly the same pier and mount and the pier is installed as in drawing A.

[BrunoFontaine]

Thank you very much to both of you !

As pointed by Lucas, there is one error in each drawing : the north pole axis is pointing south in a) (!!) and the mentions N and S at the top of the drawing b are wrong in drawing b.

Depending what you look in each drawing, you might consider either a or b could be valid (or wrong!)

Now that those two errors are corrected, it is interesting to notice that the two solutions are hopefully identical, one seen from the East side and the other from the West side

And the center of the pilar must be offset 13 cm to the South from the dome center !! 

I will sleep much better tonight

Thanks again 

Configurations ciblesV2.pdf

[lukepower]

Looks good now

I won't sleep well until the new optics are here and on the mount

[BrunoFontaine]

You are right, but a first step is achieved !

[nakbrooks]

Bruno - if you don't mind me asking, which dome are you using and where are you located?

[BrunoFontaine]

The dome was my father in law's one. I don't know where he bought it 20 years ago. I just moved it from Banon (Alpes de Haute Provence) to Pierrevert (the place where I live most of the time know. So my (future) observatory is located near Pierrevert - itself near Manosque. I 'll send you photos when it is finished (a few weeks I hope )

[nakbrooks]

Mine is a fair way to the west of you, in Hautes Pyrenees.