Dome Park command

Sequence Generator Equipment Compatibility
1

Is there a manual Dome Park and UnPark button (for testing?) Or some way to manually initiate a dome park/unpark? I’m trying to diagnose problems with parking and unparking my Exploradome (Foster Systems - AstroMC controller).

Thanks,
DaveNL

2

@dnube

In a way, yes. Make sure the dome is slaved to the telescope (in SGPro). Move the telescope and dome to the intended park positions. In the Telescope module (or control panel), click “Set Park”:

Then when you click the “Park” button (next to Set Park), both the mount and the dome will park.

3

@Ken

Thanks for the clarifications.

A couple more questions:

  1. Does the “Park Observatory with Mount” have to be checked (Slave Settings) for this to work?
  2. How do I move the Observatory dome manually before setting the “Park” position? SGP Left/Right controls do not seem to work, and if I manually move East/West in Foster AstroMC, it immediately disconnects ASCOM connection (and thus it no longer slaves under SGP control - until I reconnect ASCOM from AstroMC end).
  3. Does the “Set Park” function in SGPro use it’s own process for remembering the dome park position, or is it sending a “Set Park” command via ASCOM to the dome software (AstroMC in my case), and relying on the dome software/driver to track/remember the dome park position?

It seems if I move the dome manually in AstroMC and then select “Set Park” in SGP, it works - sort of. Of course, I have to manually reconnect ASCOM (from the AstroMC end). When I select “Park” in SGP, the mount moves to it’s park position and the dome initially moves to the dome park position (purposefully set to be away from the mount park position), BUT then it seems that slaving is still in play and takes over, moving the dome opening to the mount park position.

I suspect this is a Foster AstroMC issue - it doesn’t discontinue the slaving after it receives a dome Park command.

DaveNL