Hi - I’ve just installed a new ASA imaging newtonian into my observatory, and have hit a bit of a snag. When the autofocus routine moves the focuser, the ASA software reports the position in mm, and the fourth decimal is usually varying by a couple of microns. Unfortunately, this means quite frequently the SGPro routine times out because the focuser value has changed a micron.
Is there a way of setting a tolerance on the focus position so that it will still run the AF exposure if the reported position is within a micron?
I’m not sure I follow, focuser position is a whole number and does not contain any precision after the decimal. When SGPro asks the focuser to go to position 100, it expects that the focuser get there and not 99 or 100.
Hi Ken, I should have been more clear. The focuser software on screen reports it in mm. But the main problem seems to be that SGPro says move to 1185. The focuser moves to 1185, then watching the output onscreen it moves to 1184, then 1185, then back again, so the AF routine fails, although about 50% of the time it will start an exposure when the focuser is briefly in the right spot. I noticed the ASA autofocus software has a tolerance built in of a couple of microns and puts up with this behavior.
I’ll ask the ASA guys to sort out their focuser too, but I don’t expect a very rapid response.
regards,
Andrew.
Did you ever get the AAF3 to work properly with SGP?
Nope. Unfortunately the guys at ASA weren’t interested in helping, and I ran out of talent trying to write an ascom focuser driver that returned a thresholded version of the AAF3 driver’s position. As a result I’ve had to give up on SGPro and use the sequence software that comes with the ASA mount, which is considerably less reliable.
not something new? does anyone use ASA focuser successfully?