ASCOM error with the Planewave L350

[Peter Bresler]

I just go a Planewave l350. I am getting this error while guiding, "Ascom failed checking...."

[bw_msgboard]

Hi Peter.  This is really a mess and I think you'll need to spend some time talking to PlaneWave and then learning how best to guide this mount.  To start, has the mount been "tuned" correctly for your specific location and weight load?  Here's why I think there's a problem with the mount:

 

 

This is how the Dec performed WITH NO GUIDING.  You were getting swings of over 5 arc-sec and very erratic behavior.  This should look like a smooth line that slopes up or down based on your polar alignment error.  I think you should ask PlaneWave about this.  It's possible, of course, that your guide scope has problems with how its mounted - frankly, mounts like these warrant the use of off-axis guiding and a much finer image scale.

 

One this problem has been resolved and the unguided Dec graph is nice and smooth, you can start to learn how best to guide it.  When using a mount like this, it's important to not thrash it or throw it into instability with overly aggressive guiding.  You will need to do testing to determine what works best with this mount and you will probably need to consult with PlaneWave on that as well - they are the only ones who know the mount details and how the encoders react to guide commands.  I think you should do some dedicated testing - meaning no automation apps at all - starting with these settings:

 

1.  RA guide algorithm = hysteresis, aggressiveness = 60%

2.  Dec guide algorithm = LowPass2, aggressiveness = 60%

3.  Stop trying to choose guide stars manually - use the auto-find functiion in PHD2

4.  Disable star-mass change detection on the Guiding tab of Advanced Settings

5.  Start each session with a fresh calibration

6.  User 2-second guide camera exposures

7. Improve the guide camera focus and better yet, move to an off-axis-guider

8.  Set the "Time-lapse" property to 6 seconds (6000ms) on the Camera tab of Advanced settings

 

Follow this procedure to get a baseline measurement of how the mount is responding.

 

https://www.dropbox.com/s/os1thorvswmzaul/How%20to%20create%20a%20baseline%20for%20guiding%20results%20using%20OpenPHD2.pdf?dl=0  

 

The error message you're talking about is because the PW ASCOM driver doesn't report the current guide speeds.  This doesn't cause any problems in PHD2 so it's irrelevant at this point.  But when you talk to them, you should point this out, it's not what we'd expect from a product of this caliber.

 

If the PlaneWave support group wants to talk to me, we can do that.  I have one of their scopes and know they provide high-quality support.

 

Good luck,

Bruce

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From: open-phd...@googlegroups.com [mailto:open-phd...@googlegroups.com] On Behalf Of Peter Bresler
Sent: Sunday, January 23, 2022 11:13 PM
To: Open PHD Guiding
Subject: [open-phd-guiding] ASCOM error with the Planewave L350

I just go a Planewave l350. I am getting this error while guiding, "Ascom failed checking...."

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[Brian Valente]

Peter 

just out of curiosity, how well balanced and tuned do you think your L350 is? 

I know that process is quite important for good tracking

Brian

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Brian 

Brian Valente

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