PEC training for Atlas Pro AZ/EQ-G mount

[jcbe...@gmail.com]

Hello everyone,

Is the process or protocol for PEC training an Atlas Pro AZ/EQ-G mount using PHD2 clearly documented anywhere?  I've read the user manual and have seen a number of links indicating that PHD2 would be very useful for training the periodicity out of the mount but I'm not clear how to put all the pieces of data together.  The attached file was generated last week during an imaging session and most all the sub images were very good even with the periodic movement and movements likely attributable to seeing.  I included the DebugLog just in case it's needed.  There are several points where the guiding excursions were quite pronounced and these usually corresponded to me touching the camera to check on the consistency of the images.  I recently downloaded the latest available Development build (v. 11) and was going to give it a run as well.  If anyone has a process that has worked to program a mount's PPEC I'm very interested in hearing how it was done.   In addition if there is anything basic that I could be changing in the guiding parameters I'd be happy to try some adjustments.  I'm using a Macbook Pro with El Capitan to guide the mount with a Lodestar X2 camera/Orion 80mm guidescope.

BTW, the Mac viewer for reviewing the Guide logs works very well.

Joe    

[Andy Galasso]

Hi Joe,

You can use use EQMOD PECPrep to program the mount's PEC.  I believe it should be able to work directly with the mount without PHD2.   It can also read your PHD2 guide log and get the RA offsets that way, in which case you would want to give it a guide log containing a single session with guide output disabled so the log represents the un-corrected PE.

Andy

[steve]

El 16/07/2016 a las 06:55, jcbe...@gmail.com escribió:
> The attached file was generated last week during an imaging session
> and most all the sub images were very good even with the periodic
> movement and movements likely attributable to seeing.

Hi
That's the same 2 minute PE I get with my EQ6. PECPrep attributes that
to the stepper gear; the gear attached to the RA stepper motor. I've
tried most things to attempt its elimination including swapping the RA
with the DEC gears. In the end, nothing I tried would eliminate it.
Interesting too that I think your mount has a belt drive (?) whilst mine
doesn't but produces the same PE. It would be great if you found a
solution. Meanwhile, I think if your images are OK then just keep going
and forget it. Do post back if you find anything though.
Cheers, clear skies and good luck,
Steve

[Joseph Beyer]

Thanks for the information. I'll keep looking for a solution. Will definitely report back if anything improves the guiding curves. I'm with you on your approach for intervention. I'm happy with the images from it so don't feel the need to change anything right now.

Joe

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[Joseph Beyer]

Thanks Andy.  I'll have a look at the program. 

Joe

[jcbe...@gmail.com]

Good morning,

Passing along some new and hopefully helpful information.  I haven't had a chance to try using PECPrep yet but I did use the latest build version of PHD2 last night and the mount performed better than it had since I purchased it.  Coincidentally I also used the latest version of the Polemaster software and the GUI has been improved a lot.  The previous version absolutely didn't work for color-blind people like myself as it required a lot of imagination in determining where the colored dots were relative to the stars they were identifying.  At any rate I felt the polar alignment was fairly good after using the new version.  

I installed PHD2 2.6.1 ver.11 (OS X) as a clean install and made a new user profile with the setup assistant and left all parameters as default.  Setup and connection to all the devices worked immediately and I was ready to go.  Kudos for the changes to the GUI in this build, they are very helpful.

I've attached the log and debug files for reference.  From the minute I started guiding I was thought something had gone wrong because I couldn't see the RA and DEC tracings at the +/- 1-3 arc-sec scale then realized the lines were nearly on top of each other and continued that way most of the night.  After calibration I moved to a different target (M8/M20) and guiding picked up right away.  In the past I've had problems guiding at such a low point in the sky.  At some point the guide star was lost but I only needed to pick another and off it went.  I *really* didn't want to shut it down when the moon finally came up as everything seemed to be working so well.  Looking at the tracings with the viewer there is still some periodicity to the line but the movement is markedly less.  There are also several points where I checked the images on the camera and perturbed the guiding but it restored in short order.  The images I acquired look very good too.  I'm hoping everything is as it seems and I'm not just looking at the tracings through a rose-colored viewer! ;-)

At any rate the new build looks great and seems to work the same.  No hairs were pulled in the process of acquiring last night's images!

Cheers, Joe 

[bw_msgboard]

Hi Joe.  I think you somehow made a mistake with the new profile – you have a focal length of zero.  So there’s no way to judge your guiding performance but it probably wasn’t as good as it looked. L  I don’t know how this happened if you used the new-profile-wizard – that shouldn’t let you complete the process without specifying a non-zero focal length.  How did you do that?  Or did you somehow end up using a different profile than you intended?

 

Thanks for the feedback on the new UI though.

 

Good luck,

Bruce

 

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[bw_msgboard]

Sounds like a plan.  There’s nothing to say you didn’t get good guiding, we just can’t know.  And in the end, it’s the images that matter, not the graphs. J

 

Just to be abundantly clear, this is where the wizard wants the focal length entered:

 

 

I just have a nagging suspicion that you weren’t using the wizard but did something else.  You get to the new-profile-wizard by clicking on the ‘Manage Profiles’ button, then selecting ‘New using Wizard…’.

 

Good luck,

Bruce

 

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From: Joseph Beyer [mailto:jcbe...@gmail.com]
Sent: Sunday, July 24, 2016 11:34 AM
To: Bruce Waddington
Subject: Re: [open-phd-guiding] PEC training for Atlas Pro AZ/EQ-G mount

 

Thanks for taking a look Bruce.  Kind of what I expected.  Something didn't seem right given the readouts.  I'm not quite sure how the value ended up being "0" after using the setup wizard but it's right there in the profile.  It's possible some warning notice did pop up and I cleared right though it imaging it to say, "nice job!".  I'll make a new profile to check all the values are correct and give it another try.  The silver lining is the roughly 30 - 4 minute subs I acquired during this "stellar" guiding episode have pinpoint stars across the frames except for the image where the guide star was lost and it has some blurring.  Overall the night was still a success. 

 

Regards, Joe          

[Joseph Beyer]

Bruce,

Thanks again, I'm sure you're right.  I've got a new profile entered with all the correct data so we'll see what this evening brings.  

Joe

[Farzad Khosrownia]

Hi Andy. I am in the process of using PEMPro to train my Atlas Pro. I am not sure if the mount itself can be permanently programmed. Can you elaborate please?

Thanks

[Andy Galasso]

Hi Farzad,

Sorry, I don't know the answer to that.  If you don't get any answers in this forum, you can post in a forum dedicated to your specific mount.

Andy

[jcbe...@gmail.com]

Hello Farzad,

It is possible to program a permanent PEC curve into an Atlas Pro mount, however the loaded PEC curve can only be activated and used with the hand controller. A preprogrammed/preloaded PEC curve cannot be activated using an EQMOD-ASCOM connection to the mount. EQMOD has its own version of PEC which can be activated at the start of guiding or an alternative is the PPEC algorithm in PHD2.

Joe

[Farzad Khosrownia]

Hi Joe,

I think the PEC for the Atlas is stored in the hand controller itself otherwise it could be accessible through any software and in fact it would not need any software at all since it is just a text file and the mount could learn to implement it whenever it runs. But in any case it makes no difference; I never use the hand controller, and I just heard from Chris Hillitto who says: " Newer mounts like AZEQ6GT, EQ8  etc. have PPEC stored and executed by the mount controller, older mounts like EQ6Pro (Atlas) have a hancontroller based PEC (handcontroller sends rate change commands to the mount but nothing is stored in the mount itself)."

Farzad

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[u2pi...@gmail.com]

I'm just joining in to this discussion.  I recently sold my EQ-G and just bought an EQ8.  I see an experimental section on EQMOD for recording PPEC as a feature set with my mount.

I'm now confused about which PEC training or feature I should use and how I should use it.  I've used EQMOD for a long while now and love it.  Previously, I ran the PEC training in EQMOD on my EQ-G and it did its thing and ran the PEC.  I was guiding with PHD2 during all of that.  Now that I see that button for recording PPEC on the right side of the EQMOD screen - what do I do?  Does that PPEC in EQMOD actually program the mount's board with a permanent PEC?  How do I use it?

I've looked for instructions.  The Wiki is out-dated.  The info on the forums is scattered and very difficult to filter for the needed info.  Are there some instructions somewhere I'm missing that explain exactly how the Record PPEC feature is supposed to be used and what it does?

James

[Farzad Khosrownia]

James, I have the very same questions and I have asked Chris Shilletto? Check out this conversation on Yahoo groups:

https://groups.yahoo.com/neo/groups/EQMOD/conversations/messages/49755

It is fresh and I think someone is providing guidance.

[Farzad Khosrownia]

Here is the instruction someone provided:

"In its simplest form, just use your standard guiding app to get stable guiding going.

Go to EQMod and use the button to start PPEC training.

It may take a few minutes until the sensor detects, but after that,it will record one turn of the worm and then stop. ( Read the manual on how to interpret the power LED flash rate toindicate progress )

Once done, just use the EQMod button to enable PPEC ahnd you are away.

On rebooting the mount, just enable PPEC and wait for at least one worm revolution and it will auto synchronise and start playing back.

One hint tho.

When PPEC is ON, pulseguides can get cut short.

As such, when you are going to calibrate your guide software, turn PPEC OFF first, do the calibration, then turn it back on."

[Farzad Khosrownia]

With the exception of noting it says “pec is training” should there be any other sign of anything going on? Thanks.

[Daniel RA]

Out of curiosity, is there any advantage over using PECPrep over the PPEC in the development panel?

[Farzad Khosrownia]

I am not sure if I understand the question. PECPrep is a software that helps with creation of a PEC curve, at least in my case using PHD2 guiding log files. PPEC is Permanent Periodic Error Correction as opposed to PEC which is useful as long as the mount is parked and un-parked and not otherwise disturbed in between sessions.

I tapped on this conversation on PHD2 Guiding because I found a discussion here. I am not sure if continuing a discussion on periodic error curves in this forum is appropriate. The best place for it would be in the EQMOD Yahoo group.

Farzad