Thanks again John,

I forgot to say, the Robofocus is connected to the StellarMate through a serial-USB adapter. I dunno whether this can play, as I always use it this way without problems before. Indeed I wonder if the Robofocus makes all the steps that Ekos requires it to do, or if some can be "lost" randomly somewhere.

Perhaps other users of Robofocus have an idea? Or perhaps people with other focusing devices have experienced something similar?

Regards,
Philippe

Read More...

Thanks again, John.

The manual says that the backlash can be added in or on, and it was the case in the previous software I used. I did not find a way to set the backlash "in" with Ekos/Indi, it is always "out" (ie the correction is only applied after inwards moves). In itself it is strange.
Also, I did not get unpredictable behavior with previous software and the same hardware. Of course, perhaps I just failed to notice, one can never be sure... but in ten years or regular and fruitful sessions I am quite confident. That is why I think that somewhere (in the indi driver, in the linear 1pass...) I poorly chosed a parameter value. But which one ? It seems (emphasize on "seems") that the ability of linear 1pass to find the right solution is not affected. Since the quest is quite time consuming, can we at least have a shortlist of suspects?

Regards,
Philippe

Read More...

Thank you very much for your answer John.

With my previous focusing routines, I did not need to know the exact value of the backlash, I just have to overestimate it. Indeed, since they draw an outwards V-curve, and since the backlash correction affects only inwards movements, it acts exactly as the overscan for Linear 1-pass. Since I could make repeatable focus for years with the same hardware, I am confident on the fact that the actual backlash is lower than 15 (which corresponds to 0.15mm).

Now to answer your thoughts:

1) I fully agree, indeed before I started the procedure I was pretty sure to find a trend by setting a overestimated value of backlash. Your videos explains the point. What is puzzling is with that settings I was able to have repeatable focus (ie ekos finds the same solution) up to seven times in a row.
2) I used overscan = 40, then 15. IMO the actual backlash is lower than that, but it is worth trying in a next session.
3) I have checked for any loose screw in the Baader Crayford or in Robofocus… up to now I have not observed so huge drifts with this hardware, in more than ten years. Indeed, few years ago I made hundreds of inwards/outwards move, with the OT pointing at zenith and an heavy Sbig camera attached, the slip is about 1 tick per in/out move, no more. Of course it is worth checking again. But if the slip is greater than the CFZ, the HFR at ekos solution would be poorer that the one of the points around the minimum of the V-curve, I did not observed that.

Here is the manual ( robofocus.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/09...us-User-Manual-1.pdf . It is not very verbose about how the backlash is handled. BTW I did not find a way to select in Indi the direction of the backlash, while it is possible in the original driver.

Again, the most annoying thing is the erratic behaviour, sometimes it is stable, sometimes there is trend. A systematic error would have been easier to chase. As a result, the utility to measure the focus offsets between filters is messed up.

Thanks,
Philippe

Read More...

Hello,

I own and regularly use for more than ten years a SteelTrack Baader with Robofocus, attached either to a C9Edge (mine) or C14Edge (of a local club). Up to last year, I used a Sbig ST10 without Ekos. My focus routines were the one of Equinox Image and/or a private software developed by a friend, with them I could achieve sharp focus (fwhm below 1.5'' were not rare at 3950mm at Montagne de Lure, France) and, more important for the following, the procedures give repeatable results. The method looks very similar to Linear 1 pass, except that the V-curve is sampled by outwards moves, the solution being reached by an inward move. The Baader has an engraved scale for visual checking ranging from 0 to 30mm, I calibrated the Robofocus so that one 30mm = 3000 ticks. Hence the CFZ is 8 ticks.

Recently I bought a new camera (Zwo2600mm) and connected it to a Stellarmate Plus with Ekos 3.6.8 running on it. I am really impressed by the ergonomy of Ekos and the quality of the underlying algorithms. I made a test session few days ago with the C9, on targets such as M36 or M35 in order to have many (up to 100) stars to focus on.

My idea was to make repeated linear 1pass routines with the luminance filter (I mean with no time interval between routines) in order to check if I get consistant results. I made it either with backlash=30 or 15 (the actual backlash is certainly lower than that) and oversan=0, or backlash=0 and overscan = 40 or 15. It is noteworthy that the backlash is only "outwards", ie is applied only after inwards move. I found no way to enter an inwards backlash, anyway overscan mimics that.

In all cases, the results were puzzling. I could achieve repeatable focus (I mean, with a spread less than the CFZ with no trend) up to seven times, but otherwise I observe a frank decreasing trend. For instance, I got 1283, 1283, 1276, 1272, 1257, 1245, 1242, 1232, 1213, 1207, 1211, 1210, 1211, 1210, 1204, 1184, 1169, 1156. A visual check on the engraved scale yields a value about 1300 (more than 1 mm shift would have been noticed), which is about the right value to comply with the EdgeHd back focus. I never experienced variations that high over a whole night, at most it was a 30 ticks shift because of temperature change. So Ekos delivers variable results, but the Baader remains more or less at the same position.
The most intriguing for me is the erratic behavior: it can be stable for few focus routines, then a decreasing trend (I have not observed an increasing trend). The V-curve always seems to be correct (R2 above 0.98) and the hfr at solution is consistent from a run to another, up to the unavoidable seeing variations, at least points on the V-curve off to 15 ticks or more from the solution are clearly worse. I tried to change the polling (Default is 1000 ms, I changed to 10 sec and 100ms), with no change. I also tried to focus on only one star, I also stopped and relaunched the Indi servers... no change.

An idea ? I attach the log.

Again, thanks for that so well designed tool.
Philippe

Thank you Jarno and Jasem,

With your input I found the "control" tab in the driver panel, with the relevant slider FanSpeedAdjust. Which was at zero. I set it at another value and everything works perfectly.

This new possibility of the SDK is indeed a great thing, since, as you may now (several threads on CloudyNights on this), the fan may yield elongated stars at long focal. Because the thermal signal is low on IM571, it is not really necessary to go below -10°C, which can be easily obtained with a fan at low power, or even turned off, in winter time (temperature already at 0°C or below).

Philippe

Read More...

Hello,

Up to yesterday, I ran my Zwo2600mm + EFW + Zwo174mini with KStars 3.6.7 on Stellarmate Plus. The profile includes both cameras as "camera 1" and "camera 2" respectively.

Then I updated to KStars 3.6.8. When I turn on the Stellarmate, the fan of the Zwo2600mm turns on, as it should be.

I had to change the profile, since "camera 1" and "camera 2" are no longer available, only "Zwo CCD" is proposed. When I launch the it, the fan stops (which is normal, since I stop the cooling at the end of each imaging session). All my equipment is recognized.

But... if I switch on the cooling, the fan does not turn on. The cooling power raises and the temperature decreases, but the fan does not turn on. As a result, the cooling performance is much poorer. I thought that it was not possible to enable cooling without turning on the fan.

Everything is fine with Asistudio, so it is not an hardware problem. Seems to be a "feature" of 3.6.8. What is happening ? How to correct this ?

Thanks,
Philippe

Read More...

Hello,

I re-up this interesting thread. I have a Stellarmate bought for Xmas 2021, model SM-110, v1.7.2, the result of uname-a indicates that it is a 32 bits:
Linux stellarmate 5.10.103-v7l+ #1529 SMP Tue Mar 8 12:24:00 GMT 2022 armv7l GNU/Linux

And of course, I cannot update from kstars 3.6.0 to kstars 3.6.2. So, two questions:

1) Is there a way (not too risky) to update ?
2) Is it even recommended, since I have quite old devices like a Sbig ST10 camera (ie is there a driver issue) ?

Thank you,
Philippe

Read More...

Thank you. I understand that this is a very specific case. Is there a way to acquire darks somehow (with a different software or via the regular capture panel) and make Ekos find them as if they have been acquired by the wizard ?

Otherwise, guiding works properly without dark... as long as the guiding star is bright enough.

Philippe

Read More...

Hello,

I undid this ancient thread, since the problem is still there: I am unable to acquire and use dark frames for the guiding chip my dual sensor Sbig camera (a ST10).

I now use Kstars 3.6.0 on Stellarmate. The problem is, I can't see how to select the dual sensor in the wizard tool.

Am I missing something ? Or is there a workaround trick to make Ekos find a suitable dark frame for the guiding chip ?

Thank you for your ideas,
Philippe

Read More...

Hello,

I am interested in that topic since I also have a ST dual chip camera.

Indeed, it is possible to acquire images and guide, the problem is, I was not able to take dark frames for the guiding sensor ( indilib.org/forum/ekos/6814-dark-frames-...ors-sbig-camera.html ). If somebody has solved this, I am interested!

Thanks,
Philippe

Read More...