Major issues with my Tracking/Guiding

[Jeff Ratino]

The past month-month and a half I have been having issues with my AM5 mount. The rig is located at Starfront. I had been using the rig in my backyard remotely for several years. I had been using it with the current settings with very little problems. 

The tracking goes completely out of whack, see attachments. Seeing these will be better than me trying to explain.

This occurs:

1 2-3 mins into my very first sub of the sequence

2 After the flip

3 When it moves to another target in my sequence.

Last night it occurred during all three of these. 

Steps that have been taken:

1 PA checked

2 No snags

3 They moved the mount/scope around the pier - Not hitting

4 Settings are good

5 I sent them another AM5 thinking there was an issue with the mount, not the guiding. But it occurred on the replacement mount as well

6 ZWO recommended updating the firmware which I did. This did improve the guiding but did not solve the issue.

7 They also sent instructions on tightening the belts. I cannot do this as the mount is in Texas. I am having the original shipped back to me this week. It will be interesting to see if the issue occurs here at home. 

The one thing that solves the issue is recalibrating. I will stop the sequence, recalibrate, restart the seq and then it tracks well. I have even tried calibrating before starting the sequence but that does not work, it will still occur during the first sub. In fact it literally just happened while I'm typing this. 

Logs from a couple of the nights:

https://openphdguiding.org/logs/dl/PHD2_logs_T8tn.zip

[Bruce Waddington]

I think the first place to look is the rotator settings.  You need to determine if the "Reverse Angle" option for the rotator needs to be set.  There is a procedure in the User Guide that you need to follow - if you don't follow the procedure and just start changing things, you will end up chasing your tail.  Here's the link:

https://openphdguiding.org/man-dev/Basic_use.htm#Rotator_Selection

I can see that your imaging app is changing the rotator position for most of your slews which is why I'm pointing you in this direction. You could do a quick confirmation on this to see if the rotator is causing the problem:

1.  Disconnect the rotator from PHD2

2.  Do a fresh calibration using the PHD2 Calibration Assistant

3.  Slew to various sky locations WITHOUT CHANGING THE ROTATOR POSITION and see if guiding proceeds normally.

Good luck,

Bruce

[Jeff Ratino]

Thank you. Did a quick test this morning before work. 

I only had it imaging one target last night. So this morning after disconnecting the rotator I recalibrated, and then had it move to a second target in my sequence. And even though it only captured a few images, it seemed to have worked ok. I will do a more in depth test tonight. 

Possibly the "reverse angle" accidently got unticked. 

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[Jeff Ratino]

I read the instructions you sent me concerning the rotator and one of the things I noted was that it mentioned is that with an OAG you must connect the rotator to PhD2. I don't have an OAG, I use guide scope/camera. So my thought was that I don't necessarily need to connect it. In fact I did not have it connected when I used it home.

I did as you suggested. Connected equipment to PhD2, minus the rotator. Ran the Calibration Assistant, calibrating where it slewed. Took a 5 min image there, which was of course fine. Slewed to next object (Sh2-170), took a 5 min image, it was fine. Stopped the guiding. Slewed to next object (NGC7000), after about a minute or two, same thing. See attachment.

I even repeated this test with a different Algorithm as I noticed my rig here at home is using Predictive PEC. Whereas the one in question is using Hysteresis. 

I'm assuming we can cross the rotator off?

[Jeff Ratino]

Also, on the first test, I recalibrated where it was at and then it was fine.

[Bruce Waddington]

I wouldn't say we can "cross the rotator off" - I would say you've corrected the initial mistake of connecting to a rotator when the guide camera doesn't move with the rotator.  There is obviously a remaining problem but since you haven't uploaded your guide and debug log files, I can't determine what it is.  Once you upload those log files, we can move ahead.

Regards,

Bruce

[Jeff Ratino]

Ok, I can understand that. 

I did upload logs from a couple of nights in my first post. Unless there's something else that needs uploaded.

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[Bruce Waddington]

Obviously, the original logs were showing multiple conflated problems that I was trying to unravel .  I would like to see a clean set of data with no rotator attached and hopefully, only one problem to deal with.  Is there some reason you can't or don't want to upload them?

Bruce

[Jeff Ratino]

No, sorry didn't mean to sound like I didn't want to send them. I had just headed to bed when I saw your response. And I get up for work pretty early. I will of course send a new set of logs.

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[Jeff Ratino]

I ended up getting up a little early this morning, so I booted up the system and started one of my sequences that I have been using lately. I connected everything as usual, but disconnected the rotator from PhD2. And low and behold, it ran fine, no issues. I then added a couple of random targets, M42 and NGC 1893, shooting a couple of 5 min subs of each. It worked fine for all the targets with very good guiding. So maybe the reboot helped in some way. I am uploading the logs from last night/this morning. I will give it a try again tonight if it is clear.

https://openphdguiding.org/logs/dl/PHD2_logs_RDmM.zip

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[Bruce Waddington]

No, you still have a configuration problem, which is what I suspected.  In the test this morning, you were using a calibration that was done on side-of-pier east and none of your test slews triggered a meridian flip.  If you had tried a target in the eastern part of the sky (side-of-pier west), you would have gotten run-away Dec guiding.  In the Advanced Settings dialog, you should disable the option for 'Reverse Dec direction after meridian flip' - apparently that's not required for the ZWO mount.  Then use the Calibration Assistant to get a new calibration and then test on both sides of the meridian.  It will probably work.

Good luck,

Bruce

[Jeff Ratino]

Last I night I made the change and imaged 3 different objects. With at least one on the West side of the pier. It worked great, just like it used. I wonder if that got changed with an update. I know I had it set properly prior, cuz I used it for years without any issue. Will try it again tonight. 

Thanks for your help

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[Bruce Waddington]

It didn't change because of a PHD2 update.  Perhaps the ZWO firmware update changed the behavior of the mount controller.

Bruce

[Jeff Ratino]

So it's been working great for a week now. Some of the best guiding I've ever had. But last night upon switching targets, same thing again. See screenshots attached. I had to calibrate it when I first started the sequence last night, then it worked fine. Did the flip with no issues. When I got up this morning I found it failed on the second and third targets. 

[Jeff Ratino]

And yes the "Reverse Dec..." is still disabled. I checked it this morning.

On Thursday, November 6, 2025 at 10:25:32 AM UTC-6 bw_m...@earthlink.net wrote:

[Bruce Waddington]

Can't help you unless you upload both the guide log and the matching debug log file.

https://openphdguiding.org/getting-help/

Bruce

[Jeff Ratino]

https://openphdguiding.org/logs/dl/PHD2_logs_6iBh.zip

On Thursday, November 6, 2025 at 10:25:32 AM UTC-6 bw_m...@earthlink.net wrote:

[Bruce Waddington]

I think you're right back to where you started, you've got PHD2 connected to the rotator.  If you're using a separate guide scope/guide camera set-up in which the guide camera is never rotated, then don't connect PHD2 to the rotator.  This is what you said on November 4:

"I read the instructions you sent me concerning the rotator and one of the things I noted was that it mentioned is that with an OAG you must connect the rotator to PhD2. I don't have an OAG, I use guide scope/camera. So my thought was that I don't necessarily need to connect it. In fact I did not have it connected when I used it home. "

The logs you just posted show that your problems began when the rotator position was changed and PHD2 *was* connected to the rotator.  

Bruce

[Jeff Ratino]

OK I'll give it try tonight

[bw_m...@earthlink.net]

This shouldn’t be hard, there shouldn’t be any trial and error needed or anything to remember.  If your PHD2 profile has no rotator specified, it should just work.  But if you’re switching around between multiple profiles, then you have to insure that none of those profiles want to use the rotator.

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