Iris and Ghost

After fighting issues with the new Moravian camera and optics and focuser and tweaking the mount to do unguided images, I finally have an image from the system.

Total of 29 hours of 10 and 15 minute subs. Moravian 16200 and FSQ 106N on Paramount ME.

Iris/Ghost from Moravian 16200

3 Likes

Fantastic depth. Is this from a dark field site? I was looking at 16200 cameras and was wondering whether to step up from the QSI683.

Moderately dark, town of 9000 about 5 miles west but nothing else for at least 50 miles and nothing to the east for several hundred and I typically shoot East.

The camera is generally OK but I hope it keeps working since the dealer was so upset at having to pay himself to return it under warranty to have a less than flat mounted chip fixed that he now no longer sells Moravian. So no US dealer that I am aware of now. OTOH, Moravian did do the fix for free under warranty so it might be fine if one lives in Europe - or the no-longer-part-of Europe-UK :grin:

It took me forever to get this system working to my satisfaction. First the chip issue, then remaining tilt due to flex of their OAG system. Once I got that fixed by making a rigid non-OAG mounting for the camera and got the mount set up so it would do 10-15 min unguided, the system is now great, all the more because I can dispense with the guiding and all the associated hassle.

Nice image. At 29 hours with that camera the data looks nice and smooth.

As you (probably) know, I really like my Moravian G3-16200. It’s been going strong for nearly 3 years now. Sorry to hear of your troubles. So the sensor was not mounted flat in the housing? How did you determine that?

I’m curious if you have the newer Mark II camera?

Just yesterday I contacted Moravian to see about ordering a new Mark II camera and I noticed that deepspaceproducts.com no longer has Moravian listed as a manufacturer they sell. So as far as I know too there is no USA dealer. I’ve since decided it’s not worth the upgrade for the faster download time, which is essentially all I’d be gaining.

Mine is the same as yours, the older G2. It was the experience with the service on my camera that convinced Edward at Deep Space to no longer stock Moravian. OTOH, he did eat the shipping costs himself which is rare among dealers so I would definitely buy other products from him in the future since he clearly has integrity.

The other thing that annoyed me is that the camera was sold with and I bought the camera lens adapter yet the version I bought had no way (no 1/4-20 holes) to mount the camera when used with a lens! Pretty brain dead, that. They have now fixed that and I bought a new shell with the holes.

Most of that is processing. I use a 6 layer MMT in PI for most images and tweak each layer separately. I really hate noise. Of course, the time does not hurt. The luminance component was actually 5.8 hours (35 x 10 min).

I really must be more patient with my processing. I’m in too much of a hurry after acquiring for weeks. (My targets typically have 40-50 hours each, on account of the light pollution where I live)

Nice Image, much better than my Iris, I think the LP is too bad here for that target.

BTW, we haven’t and wont be leaving Europe, we are only revoking the EU’s right to govern us. :slight_smile: