@mahaffm:
no, that is a misunderstanding. I do the Auto Focus at the beginning of the capturing session. It is important that the scope is thermally equilibrated then. I usually put it onto the mount 1 to 1.5 hours before sunset to achieve this and start AutoFocus 0.5 to 1 h after sunset. After the initial successful Auto Focus, I let temperature compensation do the job self-acting (between frames). Usually I set the temperature difference for AutoFocus to 1.0 degree (maybe this limit could be extended to 2.0 degrees as well). So Auto Focus will be performed only when this temperature difference (versus the reference temperature at the time of last Auto Focus run) is exceeded. So excessive utilization of Auto Focus is avoided.
@Jared
Thank you for considering reducing the averaging period.
Have you tried this recently? We made some changes around how/when we toggle Temperature Compensation a while back that should better work with backlash enabled in SGP.
No, it was presumably November 2017 that I tried this and had no luck, so I gladly will try this again. Thanks for the suggestion! I’m curious whether the mechanics of my focuser are adequate for focusing during an exposure. But that’s a different story…
Thanks for the thoroughness and providing some backing data,
Jared
You’re welcome. SGP is a great piece of software. I am just trying to help a little improving it further.
Bernd