887 replies to this topic

[Newfie Stargazer]

I had my mount out the other night doing some guided wide field imaging with a Canon 50mm lens, ZWO 5 position EFW, and ASI183mm-pro camera.  I was using an Orion Mini 50mm guide scope and an ASI224MC as my guide camera.  I did a rough polar alignment using SharpCap and was guiding with PHD2.   Was able to get my guiding down to around 2.3 RMS error before the clouds finally rolled in.  Could probably do better if I spent more time on my PA and played around with the settings in PHD2 more.  Attached is a pic of my guiding graph.  This was my first attempt at guiding with this mount.  Should make for a nice wide field setup.  Next step is to get it working with the ASIAir.

 

Edited by Newfie Stargazer, 27 January 2019 - 02:47 PM.

[Newfie Stargazer]

And here is the mount with my AT60ED, camera, OAG, and EFW all attached...different set up then described above   This set up yet to be tested as at the time I was trying to get it all working with ASIAir, which for the most part was successful, except for a problem I have encountered with the go-to being off by the UTC time offset for my location.

 

Edited by Newfie Stargazer, 27 January 2019 - 02:56 PM.

[ChrisMoses]

I noticed there are a number of questions about polar alignment with this mount.

My personal suggestion would be to use the hole through the axis to get a rough alignment with Polaris and to then use Sharpcap to refine it.  You could use a PoleMaster, but Sharpcap works at least as well.

[Jerry Hubbell]

I had my mount out the other night doing some guided wide field imaging with a Canon 50mm lens, ZWO 5 position EFW, and ASI183mm-pro camera. I was using an Orion Mini 50mm guide scope and an ASI224MC as my guide camera. I did a rough polar alignment using SharpCap and was guiding with PHD2. Was able to get my guiding down to around 2.3 RMS error before the clouds finally rolled in. Could probably do better if I spent more time on my PA and played around with the settings in PHD2 more. Attached is a pic of my guiding graph. This was my first attempt at guiding with this mount. Should make for a nice wide field setup. Next step is to get it working with the ASIAir.

Hi Newfie,

Yes, in the Autoguider testing I did last April, and May I found that to counteract the relatively large non-PE excursions I needed to lower the exposure time from 1 second to 0.5 to 0.3 seconds to minimize the RMS error. Of course at this price point the gears are not nearly as refined as in larger mounts causing this amount of non-PE. You will need to pick out brighter guide stars to get your exposure times down to a half a second or less.

Edited by Jerry Hubbell, 28 January 2019 - 07:05 AM.

[Jerry Hubbell]

Hello Jerry

 

Just purchased the iEXOS 100 for my new WO ZenithStar 61 scope.  This will be the alternative to my C8 Evo while traveling.  Love the combination, slewing function was smooth.  Great images of the moon and a hawk in my back yard taken this morning.

 

Still trying to figure out the Scope Type under the Sys setting on the Android control app.  No iEXOS 100 choice in the pull down menu, per the manual.  The choices are G-11, Titan, EXOS II, EXOS Nano, EQ 120, Custom.  Which is the right choice?

 

Will try alignment tonight.  Thx.

We are working on updating all our apps to include the proper list of mounts. The iEXOS mount scaling is the same as EXOS 2 mount.

[nwww66]

Ok Got it.  Thx.

 

Quick Tip on how to get the mount to just Point and not track?

[Jerry Hubbell]

Ok Got it.  Thx.

 

Quick Tip on how to get the mount to just Point and not track?

To stop tracking use the ALT/AZ Coordinate input and put in the current coordinates. Then you can also slew around with the manual buttons without tracking on. There is no specific tracking ON/OFF switch, tracking is enabled automatically. You can also just move the mount where you want when you first start the program as tracking is not turned on until you GOTO an RA/DEC coordinate.

[Adun]

I've read a bit about the PMC8 software, and seen a few videos. I understand the intention is an open platform, but then again there are iOS and Android apps.

 

Here is my question:

 

What would it take for someone already having a guidescope and appropriate camera, to make one of these PMC8 mounts do the 3 star alignment automatically (using platesolving, like star sense)?

[Jerry Hubbell]

Hi Adun,

 

To be clear, the ExploreStars application is designed as an enhanced tablet based graphical hand controller with standard 2 and 3-star "virtual" alignment functions. These alignment functions are designed and meant to allow you to select and slew to objects accurately without having an accurate physical polar alignment. The alignment routines are used to create a mount model via a coordinate transform matrix to transform the current mount coordinate system to the celestial coordinate system. There is currently no plate solving functions included in the ExploreStars application, but that does not mean that it could not be included in the future if there is enough demand for this. Any customer interested in doing this automation is welcome to work on that with our help and the support of the PMC-Eight customer community. If you have not joined it already, I suggest you join the PMC-Eight Groups.io support forum at  

 

https://espmc-eight.groups.io/g/MAIN

 

Currently , the only way to include automated plate solving into your system is to use the PMC-Eight ASCOM driver and some software such as MaxIm DL or Sequence Generator Pro (SGP), or an ASCOM client that you would create that provides some level of scripting to automate this. The ASCOM Telescope API assumes that the mount is physically aligned prior to slewing to objects, and provides a SYNC on object function to fine tune the Slew To Target function results. All this basic SYNC function does in the ASCOM driver is adjust the motor counts to the current target RA and DEC coordinates, just like setting a watch to the current time. So the automation would consist of a simple procedure to do the following steps: 1) Slew to an object, 2) acquire an image, 3) plate solve the image, 4) SYNC the mount to the solved coordinates, 5) Slew to the target, and 6) Repeat steps 2-5 as needed to get the desired accuracy.

 

This plate solving would be more accurate if you would use the primary imaging camera and not the guide camera for this purpose. You would need to get an accurate professional level stellar catalog to do the plate solving with. We use the US Naval Observatory UCAC4 and URAT1 catalogs in our observatory to do plate solves and measurements with. To be sure these are very large catalogs with nearly 500 million stars in the URAT1 catalog. An alternative service to perform plate solving is available on the Internet as is called Astrometry.net. You can go to the website nova.astrometry.net to try it out for yourself.

 

I hope this gives you some ideas for your automation project. Thanks for your questions

Edited by Jerry Hubbell, 28 January 2019 - 12:43 PM.

[ChrisMoses]

I've read a bit about the PMC8 software, and seen a few videos. I understand the intention is an open platform, but then again there are iOS and Android apps.

 

Here is my question:

 

What would it take for someone already having a guidescope and appropriate camera, to make one of these PMC8 mounts do the 3 star alignment automatically (using platesolving, like star sense)?

Automating mount movement and then doing plate-solving would be pretty easy using the ascom driver and an open source plate solver, like AstroTortilla (astrometry.net). But, I'm not sure you could coordinate that activity with ExploreStars very easily.

 

Personally, I use TheSkyX.  I have it do a platesolve after each slew.  Voilla - no more 3 star alignment needed and my target is always centered perfectly.

[b16707]

I noticed there are a number of questions about polar alignment with this mount.

My personal suggestion would be to use the hole through the axis to get a rough alignment with Polaris and to then use Sharpcap to refine it.  You could use a PoleMaster, but Sharpcap works at least as well.

for me at least, and i cant speak for the others, this ups the cost (software and another guidecam).

 

Would love a mount as cheap as this with a nice built in polar scope! thats a dream.

Edited by b16707, 28 January 2019 - 12:42 PM.

[ChrisMoses]

Sharpcap is a very easy cheap solution.  You can use it through your imaging camera and it only costs about $15.

[nwww66]

Hello Jerry

Just purchased the iEXOS 100 for my new WO ZenithStar 61 scope.

 

Enjoying the mount and the app but having some trouble doing the 3-star alignment.  After performing the polar alignment, I notice the Park position does not match the OTA position.  Off by a few R.A. degrees.  DEC is in fact exactly 90 degrees.  Is the Park position the initial reference position?  And shouldn't the Park position match up squarely with the OTA position?  Is that why I am quite a bit off when slewing to my first alignment star?

 

Being quite new to this hobby and quite spoiled by Starsense plate-solving, I am wondering if you can recommend an similar alternative algorithm so that I do not have to spend so much time performing scope alignment.  I do have access to another open source platform in Astrel CCD integrated camera which contains Ekos, KStars and Cartes du Ciel.  Not familiar with these softwares.  Please recommend how I should proceed.  Thx.

 

ps.  Still not successful in alignment.

[Jerry Hubbell]

Hi nwww66,

 

Thanks for your purchase. When you do a 2-star or 3-star alignment the alignment routine creates a model of the mount in 3 coordinates that is used to transform or convert the mount coordinates RADEC (motor counts) to the sky coordinates RADEC (motor counts) and back again. The PARK position is the North Celestial Pole (NCP) as you suggest and is the mounts reference position as you say. If the alignment data is cleared then the normal values are RA = LMST + 6 hours (or -6 hours) and the DEC should be 90 degrees like you said. 

 

The PARK position is a fixed motor count position, namely 0 counts on RA and DEC. When the zero is converted to the RA and DEC values through the transform the RA and DEC values will not match the normal un-aligned values.  At the pole, since we are doing spherical trigonometry the numbers become really weird and can be just about any value when the coordinate transform is applied to the zero motor counts. It's nothing to be concerned about.

 

There are several programs available to do plate solving, including AstroTortilla and the Astrometry.net webpage. These are free, I think that Sequence Generator Pro (SGP) also provides a plate solve tool. I use DC-3 Dreams (Bob Denney) PinPoint plate solving with MaxIm DL. 

 

The PMC-Eight does have an INDI driver available that will work with your Linux platform. You should join the PMC-Eight Groups.io forum  https://espmc-eight.groups.io/g/MAIN and the DEV subgroup to learn more about the system and ask questions.

 

Have you found our documentation online and the knowledge base on our ExploreScientificUSA.com website?  I suggest you go there and check it out to learn more about the PMC-Eight.

 

Thanks again for your purchase.

[Adun]

Currently , the only way to include automated plate solving into your system is to use the PMC-Eight ASCOM driver and some software such as ..... The ASCOM Telescope API assumes that the mount is physically aligned prior to slewing to objects, and provides a SYNC on object function.... So the automation would consist of a simple procedure to do the following steps: 1) Slew to an object, 2) acquire an image, 3) plate solve the image, 4) SYNC the mount to the solved coordinates, 5) Slew to the target, and 6) Repeat steps 2-5 as needed to get the desired accuracy.

 

This plate solving would be more accurate if.....

Thank you for the reply Jerry.

 

Unfortunately it seems you didn't understand my question. I was not asking about how to improve slew accuracy through platesolving.

 

I was asking how to avoid spending so much time performing scope alignment (3 star alignment). User nwww66 just illustrated it better:

 

Being quite new to this hobby and quite spoiled by Starsense plate-solving, I am wondering if you can recommend an similar alternative algorithm so that I do not have to spend so much time performing scope alignment.

 

I currently use platesolving (a local astrometry install) with my (non-goto but RA driven) Exos Nano, using scripts I coded myself (to send the location to skysafari). It would be great if there was an API or protocol for the ExploreStars "virtual hand controller" to request coordinates to a platesolver (say: call a REST webservice) during this initial star alignment. This way, tinkerers like me would readily implement the API for our particular camera/lens/etc, and enjoy "Starsense simplicity" without ES having to deal with myriads of camera drivers and such.

 

This type of interoperability  is what a truly open source ecosystems strive for. And for someone who already owns astronomy cameras/guidescope, there is an appeal to getting features akin to Celestron Starsense or Meade LightSwitch as a software component of a mount.

[lspkol]

I am thinking of purchasing an iexos 100 to mount a stellarvue 90 mm apo. with an atik infinity....wt about 10 lbs.  Does this sound reasonable?This would be for traveling.

[Jerry Hubbell]

I am thinking of purchasing an iexos 100 to mount a stellarvue 90 mm apo. with an atik infinity....wt about 10 lbs.  Does this sound reasonable?This would be for traveling.

Yes, the iEXOS 100 mount should be able to easily handle 10 lbs. for astrophotography. It actually should be able to handle a little more, perhaps up to 12-13 lbs. depending on your focal length.

[drstrangelv60]

Anyone here have any real testing data / shots of this mount? How well does it actually track? Photo's taken using the mount? Setups? Any real details would be helpful please.

There is really nothing online, but, well just Ad copy.

 

Thank you

Jim

[Jerry Hubbell]

Hi Jim,

 

Our customers typically post information about our PMC-Eight mounts including the iEXOS 100 on our company forum at  https://espmc-eight.groups.io/g/MAIN.

 

You are welcome to join the forum and inquire there.

Some customers do post their experiences here in the CloudyNights Mounts forum also, but I have not seen anything about the iEXOS 100 mount yet there. 

 

Thanks for your interest

[Jerry Hubbell]

Anyone here have any real testing data / shots of this mount? How well does it actually track? Photo's taken using the mount? Setups? Any real details would be helpful please.

There is really nothing online, but, well just Ad copy.

 

Thank you

Jim

Hi Jim,

 

Just to give you an idea, I have spoken to our INDI driver developer who has been doing some auto-guiding testing and he is getting performance between 1 and 2 arc-seconds RMS. This mount is meant for focal lengths up to around 300-400 but customers are always welcome to push past that to see what they can achieve.

[lspkol]

Followup question.The stellarvue I have is focal length 630mm f/7.I am interested mainly in video rather than astrophotography. Would this work on the mount or would this be "pushing it"?

[Jerry Hubbell]

Hi lspkol,

 

How much does your telescope/camera system weigh?  If you are using it for lunar and planetary imaging the it should be fine. You would want to set up the tripod lowered all the way and maybe add a weight to the tray to stabilize the mount even further. For deep sky imaging with auto-guiding you would probably need to experiment with the settings in PHD2 to see if you could dampen any oscillations that would occur because of the weight if your telescope/camera weighed more than about 14 lbs. coupled with the longer focal length. It definitely would be pushing the limits of the mount at that point.

Edited by Jerry Hubbell, 02 February 2019 - 02:36 PM.

[lspkol]

The whole system would not weigh more than 11-13 lbs. The video exposures are generally less than 2 minutes. Would this require autoguiding? 

[NGC 2419]

As someone who is new to astrophotography, I was thinking about buying a Skyguider Pro when I came across this mount and thought, wow, someone finally built the ultimate intro mount for AP. Then I saw that there is no polar alignment scope and no fine azimuth adjustment. Why?

Even if it was $100 more, it would still compete directly with the camera guiders from Skywatcher and Ioptron.

As a beginner, I have no desire to drag a laptop outside, along with more power and cables, to use something like Sharpcap. This also goes for spending another $250 for a Polemaster.

I just want to put my camera on the mount, get a good polar alignment, and start taking subs that are on par with what people are getting with the camera guiders. Go-to capability would have knocked it out of the park for me.

After reading what I typed, I hope this doesn't come across as too much of a rant. It's just one beginner's opinion.

Clear skies!

[astroadi]

Any updates regarding astrophotography? I am interested in the mount for astrophotography and want to use it with my evostar 72ed.
Can anybody who has used the mount for AP post their pictures?

Thanks
Astroadi