No problem about the 8bit, it was working perfect tonight with the OAG prism adjusted.

Well I had that job in there twice as I had the problem with them aborting and missing data on certain filters. The first run was to get my Blue / Lum data as that was what I was missing. The other job was basically a loop on all filters until dawn hit so I made the most out of the time.
Either way I shouldn't need to do this anymore as the jobs aren't aborting anymore with the settings adjusted.

Well im using an old version of Kstars it seems, on Astroberry, I dont think its been updated in the repo ? if that's the correct terminology. I'm quite dangerous with Linux so I try and keep to the basics
I've tried the other options but couldn't get the autofocus working right, I got the particular settings I use now working and just stuck with it, I don't really trust it but it seems to do the job.
I installed Kstars on my Windows 10 pc, connected it to the Pi and was looking through all the new options. Would be very nice to use it with the scope.
I could try setup the Pi as just the INDI server and run Kstars from my PC but I found the wifi connection is hit and miss, I've had problems in the past with guiding doing it like this.

Anyway Ill keep doing some research into it all, the main thing is that the jobs aren't aborting anymore, will try and look into why the focuser on the refractor is moving around so much when the offset is selected.

I had great seeing conditions last night so switched over to my 925 at around 10:30pm for the rest of the night. Had problems getting the internal guider to work so I used PHD, it didn't pause during the focusing but worked fine and I still managed to get some great data.

Oh ! In that case yes that's what im using for guiding. I adjusted my delays a bit and im ready to go.
Got a nice run setup for tonight, moved out the OAG prism so just need to focus it up quickly at dusk and ill let the scheduler do its thing.

Thanks for the detailed reply Hy,
I have a problem with SEP focus where the V curve looks more like a W, I currently have it set to gradient using 80% of the full frame to select stars which seems to work reliably for me.
I actually already have it set like you suggested with the delay but it still can cause issues.
Ill have a bit more of a play with it tonight and see if I can get it working better.

Here are some log files from the other night which show the problem.
I usually use the internal guider but it was being weird that night, I since found out the OAG prism needed to be moved down a little more as it was tucked away too much to get enough light.

[2023-08-20T01:08:22.304 AEST INFO ][ org.kde.kstars.ekos.scheduler] - "Job 'M 33' repositioning is complete."
[2023-08-20T01:08:23.311 AEST INFO ][ org.kde.kstars.ekos.scheduler] - "Starting guiding procedure for M 33 ..."
[2023-08-20T01:08:24.312 AEST INFO ][     org.kde.kstars.ekos.guide] - "PHD2: Looping Exposures."
[2023-08-20T01:08:25.387 AEST INFO ][     org.kde.kstars.ekos.guide] - "PHD2: Star Selected."
[2023-08-20T01:08:25.394 AEST INFO ][     org.kde.kstars.ekos.guide] - "PHD2: Looping Exposures."
[2023-08-20T01:08:25.400 AEST INFO ][     org.kde.kstars.ekos.guide] - "PHD2: Star Selected."
[2023-08-20T01:08:26.992 AEST INFO ][     org.kde.kstars.ekos.guide] - "PHD2: Looping Exposures."
[2023-08-20T01:08:27.312 AEST INFO ][     org.kde.kstars.ekos.guide] - "PHD2: Star Selected."
[2023-08-20T01:08:28.043 AEST INFO ][     org.kde.kstars.ekos.guide] - "PHD2: Waiting for guiding to settle."
[2023-08-20T01:08:28.055 AEST INFO ][     org.kde.kstars.ekos.guide] - "PHD2: Exposure Time set to: 1.00"
[2023-08-20T01:08:28.063 AEST INFO ][     org.kde.kstars.ekos.guide] - "PHD2: DEC Guide Mode is Set to: Auto"
[2023-08-20T01:08:30.315 AEST INFO ][     org.kde.kstars.ekos.guide] - "PHD2: Guiding started."
[2023-08-20T01:08:30.445 AEST INFO ][     org.kde.kstars.ekos.guide] - "Autoguiding started."
[2023-08-20T01:08:30.493 AEST INFO ][ org.kde.kstars.ekos.scheduler] - "Job 'M 33' guiding is in progress."
[2023-08-20T01:08:30.506 AEST INFO ][ org.kde.kstars.ekos.scheduler] - "Job 'M 33' capture is in progress..."
[2023-08-20T01:08:30.520 AEST INFO ][   org.kde.kstars.ekos.capture] - "Ekos will refocus in 2668 seconds, last procedure was 32 seconds ago."
[2023-08-20T01:08:30.524 AEST INFO ][   org.kde.kstars.ekos.capture] - "Job requires 300.000-second Red images, has 0/12 frames captured and will be processed."
[2023-08-20T01:08:31.497 AEST INFO ][   org.kde.kstars.ekos.capture] - "Changing filter to Red..."
[2023-08-20T01:08:31.515 AEST INFO ][           org.kde.kstars.indi] - ASI EFW :  "[INFO] Setting current filter to slot 2 "
[2023-08-20T01:08:31.687 AEST INFO ][     org.kde.kstars.ekos.align] - Target updated to JNow RA: "01h 35m 11s" DE: " 30° 46' 49\""
[2023-08-20T01:08:33.727 AEST INFO ][     org.kde.kstars.ekos.focus] - "Focusing outward by 30 steps..."
[2023-08-20T01:08:33.732 AEST INFO ][   org.kde.kstars.ekos.capture] - "Changing focus offset by 30 steps..."
[2023-08-20T01:08:33.932 AEST INFO ][           org.kde.kstars.indi] - ASI EAF :  "[INFO] Focuser is moving to position 18317 "
[2023-08-20T01:08:34.546 AEST INFO ][           org.kde.kstars.indi] - ASI EAF :  "[INFO] Focuser reached requested position. "
[2023-08-20T01:08:35.511 AEST INFO ][   org.kde.kstars.ekos.capture] - "Capturing 300.000-second Red image..."
[2023-08-20T01:08:36.043 AEST INFO ][           org.kde.kstars.indi] - ZWO CCD ASI2600MM Pro :  "[INFO] Taking a 300 seconds frame... "
[2023-08-20T01:09:14.015 AEST INFO ][     org.kde.kstars.ekos.guide] - "PHD2: Settling failed (timed-out waiting for guider to settle)."
[2023-08-20T01:09:14.025 AEST INFO ][     org.kde.kstars.ekos.guide] - "PHD2: Settling failed, aborted."
[2023-08-20T01:09:14.059 AEST INFO ][   org.kde.kstars.ekos.capture] - "Autoguiding stopped. Aborting..."
[2023-08-20T01:09:14.087 AEST INFO ][   org.kde.kstars.ekos.capture] - "CCD capture aborted"
[2023-08-20T01:09:14.099 AEST INFO ][     org.kde.kstars.ekos.guide] - "Autoguiding aborted."

That's how I have it, I had it run last night and if it weren't for the clouds it would have been a successful run, I restarted it at about 3am and the rest was fine also until dawn.
The problem is that I use the Luminance filter for the focusing and platesolving. It doesnt change back to the correct filter for the photo sequence until a moment before capture, this throws off the guiding which throws off the capture sequence.
Its not too bad when doing many short exposures as I can throw away the first one but when im doing 600s exposures it sucks to throw away every sub that follows a slew or autofocus.
Sometimes it will abort the jobs altogether and shut down but I've since adjusted the abort options and thats seems to sort itself out now.

Next night ill take a screen recording of exactly what's happening.

Last night wasn't too bad but I still had to throw away some subs but didnt have any total aborts for any unnatural reasons

I'm trying to iron out the last couple of gremlins in my setup.
Have tried many options but cant seem to get around this issue.

Basically when I run my scheduled job, it starts, slews, solves and starts guiding.
After the guiding starts the filter changes from Lum to another filter, the offset changes the focus position and throws off the guiding - at this point the autoguiding starts trying to catch the star which just moved and takes some time to settle down, up to 45 seconds sometimes.
Either it will abort because the guiding RMS is too high or it captures junk and moves the frame out of whack.

I've tried delays with the guider, image capture and anywhere else I can try delay but its sketchy at best.

Is there a way to make the guiding start after the filter has been selected and the focus offset happens?
This would seem to solve the issue.

Or am I doing it wrong ?

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@Marco
Good to hear !

@AstroMuni
I haven't had to deal with this yet fortunately, my refractor is only a few months old and the focuser still feels tight.
Perhaps tightening very slightly the screws for the focus gear mesh adjustment ?
I dont have any experience with that at all so I cant really recommend anything.

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Good to hear !
I haven't had to deal with this yet fortunately, my refractor is only a few months old and the focuser still feels tight.
Perhaps tightening very slightly the screws for the focus gear mesh adjustment ?
I dont have any experience with that at all so I cant really recommend anything.

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Thanks for the reply, I haven't had a chance to run it outside yet but the last few times I tested it out it seem to work ok.
Hopefully it was sorted by the encoder reset, I had tried this before but not the same way as described in the stellarmate forum link posted earlier in the thread.

There's a couple of things I thought could be to blame, about 2 weeks ago I was out at a dark site and had to manually enter the time into the pi4 as it wasn't connecting to my hotspot (my fault).
I doubt this is the problem as the next time I booted up at home it connected to my wifi and updated itself as I had run many sessions since then.
I'm thinking it was more likely I pressed the wrong button with the encoder purge / save under the INDI control when parking one night.

Ill take logs when flipping the next few times incase it happens again.

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