17" CDK and Equatorial Mounting

Posted 23 March 2014 - 11:27 PM

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Posted 24 March 2014 - 09:36 AM

I haven't installed siding to the triangles yet
And the sides will be covered by skirts to protect the inside from rain/snow - I should have mentioned that

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Posted 24 March 2014 - 09:47 AM

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Posted 24 March 2014 - 10:05 AM

The aluminum rails are U channels and the casters have metal frame/bearing but urethane/polypropylene wheels.

I'll post some pictures

I've got all the parts for the mount but I was waiting for the ob to be finished before I finalized the assembly as it's already too heavy and I can't the dec assy without making the whole thing impossible to move

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Posted 24 March 2014 - 10:39 AM

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Posted 24 March 2014 - 11:13 AM

yeah I am going to run a couple of metal cable in a cross pattern on the H structure because the roll off beams kind of shake a little bit when the roof is out. xD

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Posted 24 March 2014 - 11:24 AM

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Posted 24 March 2014 - 11:28 AM

it's mostly the motor/screw drive that you hear. We're the only people living full time there, most neighbors only come here once a month or so

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Posted 07 May 2014 - 06:25 PM

I got the focuser!
It is one of the first MoonLite CXL 3.6"! (although I am pretty sure I remember Ron saying it's the first one made in this size!! )

Fits perfectly! I already modeled it (I needed the length) so I can design and make the correct extensions and part for it!

On the picture a M94 to M72 adapter is installed to the drawtube. However I will not be using this adapter to conserve backfocus. But I love this M94 thread on the drawtube! The AO will screw in directly into it (Did I mention that I am remaking all the mechanical parts of the AO - so that the unit is stiffer)

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Posted 08 May 2014 - 05:42 AM

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Posted 08 May 2014 - 07:12 AM

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Posted 08 May 2014 - 12:01 PM

thanks guys
I designed the PCB's and have them made through one of my vendors from work.

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Posted 09 May 2014 - 12:07 PM

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Posted 12 May 2014 - 06:17 PM

All of the electrical has been routed and I've done the side shrouds to "seal" the inside of the observatory from the dusty environment. I will post some pictures a little later

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Posted 26 May 2014 - 10:33 PM

The exterior is finally done.
Finished painting this week-end. Installed drywall inside, flooring is next - The mount should have its new home in a week-end or two

I have to say I am pretty happy with how it turned out!!

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Posted 27 May 2014 - 04:53 AM

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Posted 27 May 2014 - 10:56 AM

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Posted 28 May 2014 - 09:10 PM

Thanks Scott!

I finally took a little bit of time to update my website with the pics of the observatory construction.

http://www.zytratech...z-one-exterior/

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Posted 31 May 2014 - 01:55 AM

Just finished the last parts of the imaging train. I had to redo some parts to accomodate for the focuser which is a tad longer than I expected: rear cell adapter, I saved 6 mm there by switching to flat head screws. My own made OAG was heavily modified also. I'll post some pictures of those later.

One thing I'm glad I did was redesigning structure of the SX AO. I thought I would just redo the front and back plates but I ended up redoing the ring as well. Both stock plates are only 2mm thick and use M2 screws. On top of that the front and rear connections would require adapters costing back focus. I made both plates 3mm thick and used M3 screws for the body, meaning I had to make a whole new body.

It's now as short as it can be for my setup and also much beefier! Here are some images.

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Posted 31 May 2014 - 05:19 AM

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Posted 31 May 2014 - 09:57 AM

Merci Jean-Marc

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Posted 31 May 2014 - 04:55 PM

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Posted 02 June 2014 - 01:15 AM

Thanks


Well I'm happy to report that I'm done with the interior! Took care of sanding the drywall, paint and laminate flooring this weed-end.

Next the mount is moving there!

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Posted 02 June 2014 - 06:51 PM

I've been toying with an imaging source camera (mono, GigE based on the Sony ICX618ALA chip) to make it a all sky camera for the observatory. I found a cheap dome on ebay that I modified, made a couple brackets out of delrin to hold the camera in there (I've got to redo them to bring the camera up and have less vignetting, it was just a test). And I got a cheap 1.4mm C-mount lens (on ebay too) that gives me about 160 degree of FOV.

I liked that it's GigE, using POE there is one cable going through the wall to connect and power the camera.

Of course there is no suitable software for this but they provide a very nice SDK. And since lately I'm been doing some .NET programming at work for a project, it was pretty easy!

The winform app I coded allows to connect to the camera, get the current image, I've added some code to calculate sunrise and sunset for a given date in function of location and of course, automatically capture single frames into a directory.

The way it's set, I've got autoexposure on with a max autoexposure of 30seconds (longest exposure that the camera can do). I've got a 1s timer running in the background at which I check time, so that I know if it's night or day time and only start recording at sunset and until next sunrise. The .NET component that's provided is pretty neat because it's a got a "new image" event built-in which is triggered every time a new image is buffered - they're displayed in the app but only saved on the hard drive if it's during night time.

It's simple and it works well! I am going to attach this to the observatory (southern wall) on an arm out of PVC piping

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Posted 03 June 2014 - 10:29 PM

I added an auto-upload of a still every 5 minutes to my website through FTP, working fine (right now it's showing the inside of the office though xD ):

http://www.zytratech...ne-observatory/


And took some time tonight to build a few steps using left over materials.
It does the job - the door was a good 2ft off the ground, works during day time but at night... who knows.. haha

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