Need help with PHD and EQMOD - pulse guiding not working

[Jeet Kumar]

I'm trying to switch over to ASCOM pulse guiding from ST-4 but I'm having some problems getting it to work.

I have a HEQ5 mount and an Altair GPCAM mono guide camera. I have installed ASCOM, the ASCOM drivers for my mount and camera, and EQMOD.

I use an EQDIR cable to connect from my laptop USB to the RJ45 port on the mount.

EQMOD works fine: I can connect to the mount, and I can use the direction arrows to center a target in view. My current workflow is this:

1. Polar alignment using SharpCap.

2. Connect to the mount using EQMOD.

3. Start Stellarium Scope and connect to the mount.

4. Start Stellarium. 

5. Star alignment and sync.

6. Center the target using the arrow keys in EQMOD.

Everything works fine. However something goes wrong when I try to set up pulse guiding. I set ASCOM pulse guiding in EQMOD, and also set the RA and DEC rates to 0.9 (which is what I read somewhere).

I then open PHD and connect to the ASCOM drivers for the camera and mount. However when I start guiding the RA and DEC drift off the screen and it seems (and sounds) as if PHD is fighting to keep the mount on track. Is there something obvious that I've missed? There seems to be an incompatibility somewhere. What do I have to set in EQMOD to support ASCOM pulse guiding?

I have attached two nights of guide logs, and screenshots of my guide settings, EQMOD settings, and the results of running the Guide Assistant for ten minutes.

I would really appreciate the help because I'm not sure what else to try.

Jeet

[Brian Valente]

I don’t know anything about HEQ5 mount, but if you are plugging in to an RJ45 port, isn’t that just the ST-4 guide port?

 

 

 

Thanks

 

Brian

 

 

Brian Valente

Brianvalentephotography.com

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[Jeet Kumar]

No it's the hand controller port (I've stopped using the hand controller). The ST-4 guiding port is separate.

[Andy Galasso]

Hello Jeet,

Have you re-done your calibration since you switched to ASCOM?   The runaway guiding we see in those two guide logs could be a symptom of an invalid calibration such as could happen if there had not been a calibration done after you switched to ASCOM.  In any case you should definitely try forcing a new calibration.

Andy

[Jeet Kumar]

Thanks I'll try that. Does it re-calibrate automatically if you create a new profile? And is there anything else I should change in EQMOD to support PHD guiding? 

[bw_msgboard]

Hi Jeet.  A new profile will force a calibration but there are many other ways to do it.  The quickest is to just do a shift-click on the guiding icon but you can also go to the Guiding tab of the Advanced Dialog and check the box for ‘Clear mount calibration.’  Or use the Tools menu/Modify Calibration/Clear Calibration… .  Lots of ways, but most of us use the shift-click technique.

 

This Wiki link gives you our best advice on working with EQASCOM:

 

https://github.com/OpenPHDGuiding/phd2/wiki/EQASCOM-Settings

 

Good luck,

Bruce

 

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