Update RE: [open-phd-guiding] Wont Dither Using SharpCap Pro
gol...@charter.net
Finally a clear night in MI that I could take advantage of based on the recommendations. But it was a short window.
Quick summary of the night, was I did a proper PHD2 calibration (still have DEC issues) with everything set to defaults. I used ASCOM instead of CPWI for the Celestron driver and dithering worked. I also ran the GA and took the recommendations. So I am now functional but I need to do some more work. I have a link to the guide logs at the bottom of today email.
- Did a proper calibration, pointing south and at 45 degrees above the horizon and the calibration failed. It still complained about Dec backlash
- Ran the guiding assistant and took the recommendations.
- Accepted the GA recommendations
- Reran the calibration with recommendations, still complained about backlash
- Did another GA and accepted its recommendations
- Then let it guide and did a stack in SharpCap and dithering worked using ASCOM (CPWI not used) I could see commands in SharpCap and the response for settling. I never remember seeing the settling numbers when CPWI was used. This was at the south & 45 degree target
- I then slewed to a target in a different area in the sky and I then did my normal work flow in SharpCap which was to plate solve to center the object.
- Once centered I started guiding and started my stack. (Second target is where I was getting the no dither problem which started this request for help). Guiding worked and dithering worked and I was again getting feedback in SharpCap. Stacked this long enough to see the object and then I stopped. I slewed to another target with the thought to guide for an extended time and dither, I then had a mount issue which forced me to reboot the system. Rrrrrrr fragile software systems.
- At this point in time, I thought I should get my polar alignment to a reasonable number. I started the night and I was aware it was way off but the window of clear sky time was short and I wanted to get the PHD2 calibrations done first. Anyway between the polar alignment and then collominating my SCT, I then ran out of clear sky. I slewed to my next target and then got PHD2 connected see 01:35:45 and started dropping stars, I looked up and just like that the clouds rolled in and the night was done.
So one question regarding backlash compensation for DEC is it currently not enabled in the Algorithms (Resist Switch) should this be enabled?
https://openphdguiding.org/logs/dl/PHD2_logs_zEHJ.zip
~73
Don
KD8NNU
2014 3905CC Top Gun :-)
5 miles from Downtown Hell MI as the crow fly’s
-.- -.. ---.. -. -. ..-
From: open-phd...@googlegroups.com <open-phd...@googlegroups.com> On Behalf Of Brian Valente
Sent: Sunday, April 19, 2020 2:36 PM
To: open-phd...@googlegroups.com
Subject: Re: [open-phd-guiding] Wont Dither Using SharpCap Pro
Yes for now I’d stick with the defaults. Get a baseline and go from there. Don’t change any values while you are doing this even though it’s tempting
On Sun, Apr 19, 2020 at 11:12 AM <gol...@charter.net> wrote:
Hi Brian,
Thank you for the quick reply.
By starting a new wizard will that also change the algorithms back to the defaults? If not what should I be using for RA & DEC controls.
I will also try per your suggestion to use ASCOM and not use CPWI.
Plus I will recheck my polar alignment, I wonder if I bumped my mount in the cheap observatory I built.
~73
Don
KD8NNU
2014 3905CC Top Gun :-)
5 miles from Downtown Hell MI as the crow fly’s
-.- -.. ---.. -. -. ..-
From: open-phd...@googlegroups.com <open-phd...@googlegroups.com> On Behalf Of Brian Valente
Sent: Sunday, April 19, 2020 11:32 AM
To: Open PHD Guiding <open-phd...@googlegroups.com>
Subject: Re: [open-phd-guiding] Wont Dither Using SharpCap Pro :-(
Hi Don
you have quite a lot going on here, it appears not just one thing that's causing you headaches.
as you may know sharpcap controls the dither amount and settling, PHD just does the dither and reports back the values.
your situation suggests your dither is failing because the guidestar is not getting under your settle criteria. however, other than your one run (segment 3 starting at 22:33) i don't see any dither commands being sent to PHD. And it looks like your pixel resolution combined with mount performance should still get this under your criteria.
here's your run with successful dithering, you can see the dithers:
here's a subsequent run, no dither commands that I see:
Here are some symptoms/issues i see and suggest:
- I would avoid the CPWI driver for now. there have been many users reporting that it does not work reliably at the moment for guiding. use the ascom driver. that alone may clear this up.
- i see a number of aborted runs where the DEC seems to run amok: here's one example. is this the case where your dec is not responsive?
- your polar alignment appears to be significantly off. look at the dec axis here, almost all of your corrections are on one side:
- i didn't see a guiding assistant run which would have pointed this out. If you haven't already done so, i'd recommend doing a baseline guiding, to make sure you have your settings basically correct. details are here: https://www.dropbox.com/s/os1thorvswmzaul/How%20to%20create%20a%20baseline%20for%20guiding%20results%20using%20OpenPHD2.pdf?dl=0
without getting too much into your mount performance, I see you are using PPEC, but at this point i think you should stick with the default setup. It appears your RA periodic error is quite high (20"+) which of course explains why you might do that, but at this point your DEC seems to be your limiting factor.
it almost certainly will ask you to do things you've already done, but it's best to start with a clean slate, following those steps. it helps isolate what are the issues.
On Sun, Apr 19, 2020 at 6:42 AM <gol...@charter.net> wrote:
Hi All,
Hopefully someone has an idea on why I am not able to dither using SharpCap pro.
I have a Celestron AVX mount that I am using and the first time I was not able to dither, I also was not able to calibrate due to excessive backlash in DEC. I went and physically adjusted the hardware worm gears and so on to minimize the issue. Last night the 18th was the first time I was able to get out with clear skies and try the system out after adjustments.
For the connection between PHD2 & the Mount I am using the latest CPWI software to connect and control the mount. I choose CPWI ASCOM for the mount connection and I use the same connection for SharpCap. All software was updated to the most current production releases.
My process last night was to run a calibration which was successful although there was a warning about the ratio between the PA and Dec predicted results. Begins at 2020-04-18 22:25:24 (prior to that I was going thru the manual and reading different things and the system was on and off many times for various reasons)
I then slewed to my first target and started guiding and dithering worked. This shows up in the log at Guiding Begins at 2020-04-18 22:32:21. Link to guide logs at the end of the email.
I then slewed to the next target and then I started to get the message in SharpCap;
- Dither Status: Cannot dither- PHD@ is not settled – currently Settling
- note I did not have any messages in PHD2.
- PHD2 Status: Guiding
- Settle Status: Settling: 2.1px for 0.0/2 0s.
All these status messages are shown in the screen shot of the SharpCap guiding screen shot.
For the settings of SharpCap, they were modified as I to see if I could change something to get it work. So if there is something way out of line I was making adjustments and turning guiding off and on in SharpCap to see if it would settle.
In summary originally the first time I used PHD2 guiding dithering was working. The second night out I had the issue with the failed calibrations due to large DEC backlash which gave me a logical reason why it failed so I worked on the hardware. Then tonight the first time being used after the HW adjustments and after a new calibration it dithering worked for one target. After slewing to the second target of the evening I received the message in SharpCap about settling, so is it a SharpCap bug, a parameter issues that I don’t know about or a PHD2 setting or am I using the wrong guiding algorithms.
Hopefully someone has already found the solution to this and can give me some advice. I don’t get much observing time in Michigan due to cloudy conditions so when I do get out I want to have all the tools in the toolbox working.
https://openphdguiding.org/logs/dl/PHD2_logs_YjsD.zip
~73
Don
KD8NNU
2014 3905CC Top Gun :-)
5 miles from Downtown Hell MI as the crow fly’s
-.- -.. ---.. -. -. ..-
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Brian Valente
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gol...@charter.net
Hi All,
Hopefully this is not a repeat message, but it appears my email is no longer sending to the group.
It was clear last night and I went out to play even though the moon was bright as can be. Anyway from my perspective I had a successful night under the stars with my system I learned a lot about using PHD2 and its connection to SharpCap. I did mess up though, as Brian wanted me to do an extended guiding run without any dithering and frankly I messed this up and did not get that completed.
The other item pointed out was that I had extreme dither movement. Currently my settings in SharpCap are only requesting 3 pixels (started higher for the night but still were single digits) I played with this setting and I was starting to think there was a bug in SharpCap as I still had the large excursions. Looking at all my PHD2 settings this morning, I found in the Advanced Setup- Global tab, Dither Settings are Random and Scale 3.0. Which means if I understand it correctly that I am multiplying the request value in SharpCap by 3 which makes sense now why I have a huge dither. Plus since my mount has a large amount of backlash I should be using the Spiral setting per the manual. So these adjustments to Dither settings have been made, so we will see next time out.
I also did not use CPWI but just the ASCOM driver for the Celestron mount and for most of the night I had zero issues. I did however find a sequence if I started stacking in SharpCap before guiding was started and settled then SharpCap reported in its guiding window that Dithering could not take place because PHD2 did not settle. The only way I could clear this setting out was to restart SharpCap, no stopping and restarting of guiding in PHD2 or SharpCap would clear the error. I did this sequence a couple of times and it repeated so I will report this to SharpCap as I don’t think it is a PHD2 error. Good news to me is I understand it and know how to deal with it.
So from the perspective of improving my overall guiding I would say that insufficient data is in the log, however the system was consistent in the data I am looking at and I just may be at the limits of my whole system. By system I mean the AVX mount, no pier in my observatory (tripod sits on the wooden decking), 2.14 arc-sec/px and flexure (no OAG)… I am interested in comments on what I should expect from my mount & guide camera recommendations so that I can better understand what is good vs I have a problem going on.
Anyway knowing I do not have a long guide run without any dithering I still attached the log if someone wants to look at it and make comments so that if there are other obvious things going on I can fix these also.
~73
Don
KD8NNU
2014 3905CC Top Gun :-)
5 miles from Downtown Hell MI as the crow fly’s
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Brian Valente
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