That’s great Rob. I hope too the new drivers have resolved this.
I also had made the change in the “sleep” setting for USB - and I installed the latest ATIK drivers - but I did not clean the registry at all. Things appear to be working pretty well now with the efw2 and I haven’t had a session fail in a while. But sometimes at the start of a session there will be a failure to move and I will have difficulty reconnecting to the wheel after disconnecting. But it does seem to reconnect after a couple tries - and without disconnecting power. So it is still a little odd - but basically usable right now.
When I was having problems I would do tests in daylight with fake imaging sessions that exercised the wheel. Back then it was failing pretty reliably. Maybe the sleep setting and the latest drivers have improved things. I will see when the next failure happens.
Frank
I suggested this before and no one acknowledged my suggestion. However, what is being reported in terms of the continuous “Moving” dialog and the intermittent nature of the problem mimics exactly my experience with my EFW2 on several occasions in the 6 years I’ve had it. It sounds like there are issues here related to drivers and settings. However I have only ever updated my drivers when upgrading to a new computer and never in response to these issues. My solution has always been a hardware adjustment to tighten the motor tension screw. Since there was no comment when I posted this suggestion previously, perhaps you are all including this adjustment in your trouble-shooting, in which case I apologize for bringing it up again.
…Keith
This is certainly worth trying. I remember the first time you suggested this I tried it myself but it didn’t work.
But I think there may be two issues going on and tightening the motor tension screw only addresses one. For some people the filter wheel would rotate and stop at some random spot. In this case tightening the motor tension might address that issue. The other solution put forward by Atik was to replace the elastic band.
But for myself and I think a majority that have dealt with this, the problem is not that the filter wheel stops at some random place. In my case the filter wheel did always stop at the correct location, but the software would never report that the wheel had stopped. So the “Moving…” message would always stay up. This is a software/driver/communication issue.
Guess I’ve been lucky with my EFW2, as I haven’t had driver issues and it has worked pretty much flawlessly save for needing motor tension adjustment once in a while. Good luck with sorting out your driver issues.
…Keith
The reason I wasn’t excited about doing the adjustment is that when I disconnect power and then reconnect it - it immediately moves just fine to find the home position. There is no indication of any mechanical issue.
And right now it appears to work ok without doing anything mechanical.
So I’ll see if it fails again and stops a sequence.
Frank
However, that was also the behaviour that I observed. It would say “Moving” and never settle on a filter. If I unplugged the FW and recycled the power then more often than not it would start up fine. As in Joel’s experience, the problem for me was intermittent and usually resolved by recycling the power. However, after adjustment it would stop happening for months to years, so I assumed that the adjustment of the motor tension had something to do with the issue. This thread on Cloudy Nights from a few years ago reports that a similar problem has been fixed for several other EFW2 users by adjusting the tension:
https://www.cloudynights.com/topic/453148-problem-with-atik-efw2/
…Keith
All the issues I reported above were fixed by driver updates back in August or September of 2016. I did several nights of imaging without a hitch. I did not have to fiddle with anything mechanical. Being in the Pacific NW, I haven’t had the opportunity to image since then.
Chris Golden of Atik is very responsive if you post on the Atik forums or send him an email.
Ajay
I bow out of this discussion with an apology - it wasn’t my intent to say that all EFW2 problems are due to motor tension. In the spirit of “if all you have is a hammer everything looks like a nail” I just wanted people to be aware that motor tension issues can look like driver issues. If you find that the issues recur despite driver updates, try adjusting the motor tension. Best to have more than one tool in your toolbox. I think I’ve flogged this point enough. Good luck with resolving your issues.
…Keith
No need to apologize Keith, you make a valid point. It may help someone in
the future.
It worked for me Keith, I was chasing nonexistent driver problems for months. It would work perfectly at the start of the night and then later on the problems would start, I guess it was the cold loosening the contact between wheel and motor.
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Agreed I have had a sequence fail on a cold night 3 hours into an otherwise successful run due to the filter wheel never setteling.
I still occassionaly have to power cycle the EFW2 before SGP decides it is not longer moving on first start up. After that it is usually pretty reliable.
But I wanted to ask. I saw someone mention getting a replacement band for the wheel. I have not been successful in finding one. Anyone know where to find one?
Keith,
I did not mean to imply that you were incorrect. Obviously some issues are mechanical, but for me the problem was purely one of software. Chris Golden at Atik mentioned that were many ancient bits of code he had to clean up when I reported the problem and did some testing for him. The newer drivers are better.
Ajay
I honestly have never had an issue with my EFW2 that I could identify as due to the driver - probably because I’m using an ancient operating system (Win 7) that is compatible with the “ancient bits of code” in the old driver. I’m reluctant to update the driver unless I run into problems - the “if it ain’t broke, don’t fix it” philosophy. If I upgrade my computer then I’ll take your recommendation and try the newer drivers.
…Keith
UPDATE: so far, after 4 or 5 nights cycling through 2 min. exposures the wheel has been reliable since the registry clean, the re-install of the latest driver and switching off the power management at the driver settings…
That’s good to know Rob, thanks for the report.
Hey Keith, I wanted to tell you that after a couple months of trouble free use my EFW2 started acting up last night so I messed with the tension screw and that fixed the problem. In my case I needed to loosen the screw rather than tighten it. I took 480 (test) flats cycling through each exposure and no problems. So thanks for the suggestion!
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