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Guding gones wild in RA on Gemini 2

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Magnus,

I have experienced the wild swings, if you mean it suddenly slews to somewhere completely unrelated to where you want it to go - sometimes making the camera head towards the mount. I always make sure I can abort it from INDI, as I have found that when this happens the hand controller does not respond.

I have found that the best way to avoid this is to always perform a synch after a coldstart and then use align for the following slews.

I believe that it must be corrupting the model because the park at CWD still works correctly so it knows where it physically is. exactly what the problem is eludes me and is unpredictable. It means I cannot trust the mount when slewing and need to keep an eye on it. The only solution I have found is to perform a coldstart.
5 years 11 months ago #25392

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Hi!

No, I'm talking about swings in RA while guiding - up to 15" in swings,, killing every possibility of imaging, and seemingly triggered by pulses i DEC - when not guiding in DEC, it is smooth. And this is only when using pulse commandes, using ST4-cable works OK. See my previously posted guidelogs for a visual illustration.

Magnus
5 years 11 months ago #25421

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Magnus,

I am using PHD2 as the guiding program and I attach to INDI using INDI mount. I have Pulse Guding enabled and although it has an issue where it will not maintain the driver setting - reported to PHD2, it works fine.

I notice you originally said that you had no problems under Windows, but I cannot see where you mention your operating system.

I am currently running Raspbian as the Ubuntu Mate version stopped recognising my QSI camera.

In the past I have found that wild swings are generally cuased by the software trying to handle the scope being too well balanced and contimually trying to correct it. Sort of a resonce effect. You may be better off posting the question to the PHD2 forum as they have many years experience with this. I would try and unbalance the scope so it is slightly weigted east and either north or south and see if this has any effect.
Last edit: 5 years 11 months ago by Paul.
5 years 11 months ago #25424

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Hi!

Interesting. You are using Gemini 2 as well? My setup is a R-Pi with Ubuntu Mate, where the indiserver runs. THen Ekos on a linux laptop indoors.

I have posted at the PHD2 forum, (the post and discussion is here: groups.google.com/forum/#!topic/open-phd-guiding/Pgj5utiy0NA) and after having discussed there, they concluded that it probably is not PHD2 related. It works nicely in windows with ASCOM, and OK with Ekos/INdi using ST4 - with the exact same balance and pointing to the exact same spot in the sky. I switch from pulse (wild swings) to On-camera in PHD2, and it calms down. So I figure it must be Indi-related.

So very interesting if you do not experience this. What happens when you switch from pulse guiding to ST4/on-camera? And could you perhaps post your precise Indi settings for the guide cam?

What more could I check and try....?

Magnus
Last edit: 5 years 11 months ago by Magnus Larsson.
5 years 11 months ago #25425

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I am using a different mount than you (SkyWatcher HEQ5-Pro with belt mod) and I notice a difference between pulse guiding and ST4 guiding using an RPi3 as well. The mount is connected with an EQDir cable and I am using the EQMod driver. For slewing and tracking this is great but for pulse guiding I see a deterioration in guiding in RA as well. I admit it is not as extreme as in your case (about 2" to 5" but the 5" are strange jumps with an occasional larger jump up to 10" but those are very rare). When I use ST4 guiding I get RA RMS of 0.5" and Dec RMS of 0.4" constantly. I guess the RPi3 is not powerful enough to do proper pulse guiding because of the complexity of the EQMod chip and cable.

When I use Ekos on my laptop and connect the mount directly to the laptop I get much better pulse guiding. I haven't tried lately but I think I got about 1.2" RMS in RA and about 0.6" RMS in Dec but that was before I used 2x2 binning in the guiding frames. I could try 2x2 binning and see if that reduces the RMSs sufficiently as well because it reduced the RMSs with ST4 guiding from the RPi3 as well. But since I'd like to use the RPi3 and not my laptop, I am content with ST4 guiding.

So, what happens if you try to guide directly from your laptop instead of with the RPi in between? Is pulse guiding then OK or does it jump as well?
5 years 11 months ago #25435

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I ditched the ST4 cable in my case and been guiding my EQ8 with EQMod directly just fine.
5 years 11 months ago #25437

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And you're doing this from an RPi? If yes then I need to have a look at tit again and see if it works for me as well!
5 years 11 months ago #25438

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Magnus,

I can't say what happens with ST4 as my cable "broke" and I have not got around to repairing it as I decided to try Pulse Guiding.

It was not exactly obvious how to get it working but I managed and now I have no incentive to go back as it is one less cable to worry about.

Paul
5 years 11 months ago #25464

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Hi!

It looks like this problem has disappeared. It might be something to do with the pulse guide setting in Indi (what does this do?), that I've been toggling on and off and now it is on and it works (although I tried with it on before as well.....hrm). Or it's something with update of the drivers.

Anyway: now it seems to work with pulse guide through PHD2 with my Gemini 2. Maybe I can even take my first image tonight, after 6 weeks of constant trouble :)

Magnus
5 years 11 months ago #25555

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You have Non-Guide Dither Pulse checked in Guide settings??
5 years 11 months ago #25588

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Hi!
Nope, I do not have Non-Guide Dither Pulse checked. Should I? What does this do?

Magnus
5 years 10 months ago #25640

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Ok then what pulse guide setting you were referring to earlier?
5 years 10 months ago #25642

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