Constant failed plate solves with Pinpoint

I’m having a hard time plate solving consistently. I’m using pinpoint with sgp and constantly getting failed solves.
I get everything connected, find an image from astrobin, slew to the target then center now. After it takes an exposure it instantly fails. It doesn’t even try to solve in step 2 of the plate solving. I’ve notice it slewed to m42 and it was suppose to slew to the horsehead. I even had Sirius on the cameras fov and it wouldn’t solve and center.

The thing is, after I noticed I didn’t select a filter option in the control panel for plate solving it worked without issue. That was Monday. Last night it wouldn’t work at all. Not once. I leave all my equipment connected from night to night except for power and my laptop. It weird how it literally changed over night.

I’m using HA filtered binned 2x2 @ 15-20s exposures for plate solves. Any suggestion would be great.

I had this happen to me the other day. The solution was to reboot. I have no idea what the big deal was but it was definitely frustrating :stuck_out_tongue_winking_eye:

I did notice that sgp stop working and shut down a few times. My filter wheel was acting up as well yesterday. I run everything through a powered USB hub first. It’s just odd not to solve and center when the object (sirius) was in the field of view of the camera.

I tried again tonight without any success. I ran my plate solves with a lum filter. I tried both 1x1 and 2x2 binning. It didn’t fail automatically, but timed out instead. Any suggestions?

If you want to share logs and possibly a sample image, we can try to help you out.

What is the best way to share the logs? and what image would you like? Sorry about my lack of computer skills.

I’m assuming you mean the logs that show the failed plate solve?

If they are small enough (I think under 200k), you can attach them to your post. If not, signing up for a free Dropbox account is a great idea. They are a standup company and have millions of users. Up to 5GB of space is free (I think). Then you can simply “drag” your files into the dropbox “public” folder (in your browser) and provide us the link in the post.

Any image that can reproduce the behavior. You can save an image off by right clicking it and saving as a FITS file. That will need to go onto Dropbox for sure.

Yes please. Reproduce the issue and then share that log.

the link is for the log files.

Thanks @Bobby

Nothing super wrong with the log files. It would be nice if you had a sample image to share. Quick question though. From your logs:

[4/2/2015 9:16:24 PM] [DEBUG] [Telescope Thread] Plate Solve Hint RA: 6.53166666666667
[4/2/2015 9:16:24 PM] [DEBUG] [Telescope Thread] Plate Solve Hint DEC: 4.94611111111111
[4/2/2015 9:16:24 PM] [DEBUG] [Telescope Thread] Plate Solve Hint Scale: 3.82

You must be imaging with about 350mm of focal length then (to get a scale like that)? Is that correct?

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I’m imaging at 350mm of focal length with an Atik 314L+. The image scale should be 3.82.

That’s a pretty big scale… just making sure. What’s the binning of the uploaded image?

I just blind solved it and FWIW here’s the result I got.

I believe it was 1x1 ( it may have been 2x2) with a HA filter @ 15s. I also tried the mosaic wizard with the cone nebula tonight. I couldn’t get it to center and solve either. It was set at 2x2 binning for the plate solve.

Thanks Marty,

I was able to solve this with pinpoint:

Your location hint data is too far off the mark for PP to solve it correctly. When I use the hints from your log PP fails, when I use the actual location, PP has no problem.

What do I need to do to fix my problem? Is there a setting that needs to changed? I’m still learning how to plate solve. Thanks.

Your mount is providing the hint location data so you will need to sync your mount more precisely. You can do this manually by centering on a known star and using a planetarium like Starry Nights to sync the scope on a star or, preferably, you would use a blind solve service like ANSVR.

I’ll try using SN. As for other programs, Is a blind solve different then the method I use? I connect everything, copy a url from astrobin, Press solve (I use pinpoint) then I press slew to the target. Is a blind solve different? Could I still use a picture from astrobin?