Nothing but problems!

Cool, we’re having a lot of rain in Florida too.

Hi Randy,

I don’t know if this will help, but here are my settings using an Edge 9.25, Feather Touch/Micro Touch and Canon 6D. Backlash compensation if I recall is 300. I’m not hooked up to the gear now so I can’t check that for sure. You can go too low with this number, but it is hard to go too high, so 300 would likely work fine for your Edge as well as mine.

SGP not only gives me beautiful, repeatable v curves and perfect focus with my Edge, it keeps me there for hours without having to do a focus run by using its temperature compensation feature. And unlike other AP programs, SGP does not require you to leave the target to focus. This is huge, and saves so much time, hassle, and potential problems over having to slew to a bright star every time you want to check focus. I can’t speak highly enough of SGP’s auto focus routine. But with so many different systems out there, it is inevitable that getting it properly set up with the correct step size, etc. is going to take some time and trial and error. That is simply the nature of the game, and it can certainly be frustrating at times. But eventually you will sort it out, and actually find yourself almost enjoying focusing, just to watch SGP do its magic. :slight_smile:

Dean

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Where?? The only place I see to move the focuser is in the stepper motor software. And there it is going clockwise when the numbers decrease, within SGP I have no idea.
. Shouldn’t be this difficult to even get started.

It may not be possible for you to get the numbers to match in the autofocus run so that decreasing numbers make the knob turn CCW. If you can’t, it’s not the end of the world - but it also isn’t ideal either.

If you really can’t make it go the right direction, just let it go the way it wants to, and make sure the backlash compensation is in the opposite direction - so that it isn’t invoked on every step of the autofocus curve. That would be very bad, and it would make the curve take very long.

No matter what, you want the backlash compensation to be invoked only at the start of the curve - where it winds up to high numbers and then comes back and takes the curve.

Frank

What I’m saying is I can’t find where to move the focuser within SGP. I’m just trying to determine which way its turning but cant find where to move it within sgp. Havent even gotten to autofocus yet.

All I see in focus control is fine and course, no way to move it.

Oh - for that you just connect the focuser and then go to the control panel and select the tab for Focus

There you have a choice of 4 buttons to push. You either press In:Fine or Out:Fine - or you can press In: Coarse or Out: Coarse

The number of steps moved for a fine or coarse move can be set in that display - and you press the Fine or Coarse button with a direction of either In or Out.

Frank

OK see that, focuser does not move when I press coarse or fine button, numbers stay same.
I know it works with hand control and it works with stepper software and it is connected in sgp. Just says idle .

Here I sit with manual in front of me, the quickstart pdf pulled up on screen , going through step by step and buttons don’t cause any action of focuser. Focuser shows as connected but does not move in SGP. Can’t move forward at this point unless any ideas of what to try.

Ok disconnected and reconnected a few time changed iso and it started moving focuser, but no matter what it is clockwise. Tried reversing in control panel, it still rotates clockwise.

Both In and Out move it clockwise? That is odd.

Frank

No. Counterclockwise does not make numbers get smaller but larger.

Something is not right there. Can you attach a log? Also what focus controller are you using? I’m assuming that auto focus is moving things in the correct direction?

Thanks,
Jared

Isn’t that lovely.

Rigel usb nstepper.

I get that your frustrated, and I’m sorry you’re having problems. But I can’t really help without a log. You can find it under the help menu. Run AF a time or two, use the Course focus buttons for both in and out and send the log over. As a bonus if you can also include the ASCOM focuser log from the Rigel controller that would also be great.

Thanks,
Jared

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From what I see you have started with a rather challenging system for learning SGP and astrophotography. SCTs are long focus and are subject to mirror flop. Can I suggest starting with a simpler system Something like a small refractor - one of the many 80mm F/6.3 ones for example. Even a ST80. The shorter focal length makes all the set up easier and the focus system will tend to be more direct and not subject to backlash. This assumes that you have a small refractor, I wouldn’t suggest going out and buying one, however they do make a nice complement to a longer focus SCT.

Well, it shows that the focuser is working and that you appear to be one side of the best focus position. What I’d do is increase the focus step size, instead of 20 more like 40 or 60. Also reduce the star size, 6 seems a bit big and you may be missing small, in focus stars.

sg_logfile_20160813204321.zip (153.4 KB)

Thought I uploaded this zip file full of log files last night. The zip fil is attached above. Could not find the ascom rigel file. After staying up all night, I finally got some resemblance of a v curve. This was accomplished by just throwing random numbers at sgp backlash and steps. I never could calculate what was suppose to be so easy. So I am sure it is no where near perfect but itresembles a v curve. With that somewhat working, I autofocused, ran the sequence, it plate solved, appeared to be ready to start the image but just sat there. The progress bar showed no progress, the time to completion stayed the same, never moved but the elapsed time counted up. It appeared to have started phd2 as it was running. Tried and tried with same results, stopped just short of imaging.

Autofocused again, shutdown SGP, started BYEOS and took a couple images before going to bed at 4:30 am

Regards,
Randy

Randy,
So it looks like a couple of things are going on here.

  1. Failure to start - It appears that SGP is slewing and getting on target just fine but when PHD starts we’re timing out. We will only wait 5 minutes for PHD to get up and calibrated and this is likely what is taking too long. Initially I’d recommend you NOT do this. There are some ways to mitigate this timeout (having PHD save and reuse the calibration data, starting in a “calibrated” state, etc), however automation is best taken in small bites so I would leave off this portion unless you can’t be at the scope for the start. Here is how I recommend you startup the sequence:
  • Right click on the target in SGP and have SGP slew or auto center on that location (don’t do this as part of the running sequence. (ie for the first target of the night deselect “Slew To” or “Center on”
  • Once centered to your liking fire up PHD
  • Manually start the calibration process in PHD and wait for it to finish guiding
  • In SGP validate your framing is still good, Slew to or Auto Center to adjust (PHD will automatically get paused)
  • Run auto focus or focus with a Bahtinov Mask to establish good initial focus
  • Finally --> Run Sequence
  1. Auto Focus Issues
  • It appears that you’re not using any backlash compensation for the majority of your runs and if you’re focusing by moving the primary mirror this is a must, honestly the amount of backlash compensation doesn’t matter much past the “right amount”. So if you need 100 steps and you put in 200, 300, 400…etc steps that will work just fine. But if you put in 50 steps that won’t be adequate. I would leave it around 400 like you had it for one run, that was actually the only run where I saw any backlash compensation. You can generally feel this out to a certain degree.
    1. Start by disabling backlash compensation.
    • Manually focus, making sure to finish focus against gravity, take note of the position
    • Move with gravity 100 steps
    • Move against gravity 100 steps
    • Are you in focus? If so then the amount of steps in 3 & 4 is adequate. If not increase them and start at 2. \

Once you have backlash in the ballpark then you can work on getting your step size figured out for AF. But you HAVE to get backlash figured out first, otherwise you’ll just be chasing focus around. Using a Crayford focuser on the back of an SCT definitely helps to simplify backlash and mirror flop issues, and if you have mirror locks then you don’t have to worry about mirror flop either.

Hope that helps!
Jared

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Sorry for the late reply back, was out of town for a day. I will certainly try what you suggested next good night here.
So are others having this issue with PHD2? I was unsure whether to start it before the sequence or let SGP start it, could figure how it would pick a star by itself. So I will leave that part out for now.

As far as auto-focus, I was able to find the backlash box once and used 400, then I guess it didn’t save it after that and couldn’t find where it was out again. Will read back over where I missed it. Is there something I am doing wrong with step and backlash settings that are not being saved?

Thanks for the help.

Randy

Randy,

The first time you run PHD2 you definitely want to get through calibration manually. After that, you can re-use that calibration data (assuming you mark it to save/restore calibration). SGP doesn’t understand what is happening while PHD2 does a calibration and it can lead to issues if you’re relying on it. I always do a manual calibration when I change things.

You need to make sure you save your profiles after you edit them. I use the option under ‘File’ to save the current profile.

Hope that helps,
Chris

Probably so. It really depends on if their setup can calibrate in under 5 minutes. If you have a permanent or semi-permanent setup then just save the calibration data in PHD2 and make sure you have your mount connected via ASCOM to PHD2. PHD2 will scale the dec guiding for different declination, it will also detect side of pier and between PHD2 and SGP get your mount flipped.

I have an obs (that sees little use :frowning: ) but when I do run it I just load up the PHD2 calibration data and I’m off and guiding. This does assume that things don’t change in your setup. So if you’re using an OAG and rotate or you move your guider around then you need to manually recalibrate.

Where did you edit this setting and save it? There are 2 levels of “saving” things in SGP:

  1. Profile - Think of this like a template. You edit these from the Equipment Profile accessible through the Tools menu.
  2. Sequence - You can use a profile to create a sequence, but you don’t have to. A sequence stores targets as well as frame info (profiles have neither). You can edit a sequence from the control panel.

If you open up SGP you may or may not be using a sequence or a profile. It really depends on how you have things setup. But if you use and save a sequence then when you open that sequence back up your settings should be saved. Including backlash.

Thanks,
Jared