Ritchey–Chrétien enjoyers thread

[vapid patio]

oh yeahhhh

https://tenor.com/view/social-credit-credit-social-уважение-плюс-уважение-gif-1626328442317885176

[frosty shard]

You might also get screwed over by the Sahara in a few weeks' time

[vapid patio]

Yayyy

[tight lodge]

@vapid patio How's the data looking?

[vapid patio]

@tight lodge

3 and a half hr on crescent

LRGB

let me compare

[tight lodge]

You want to add some Ha?

[vapid patio]

YES

really isnt a broadband target haha

[tight lodge]

I only have 5 minutes

[vapid patio]

damn

[tight lodge]

I'm home in about 15 minutes

[vapid patio]

ok bet

@harsh matrix WHAT WE THINK

oops

AND THEY SAID WE COULDNT DO IT

Dont mind the just started guiding hehe

[tight lodge]

Actually that's when the guiding is the worst

[vapid patio]

i guess im too good

https://drive.google.com/drive/folders/10pM9uSYVo25fCne1bcEHAUZg0pWiQcar?usp=sharing

heres the lrgb data if anyone wants to take a look and see if its ok

obv gonnah ave star trails btw

[vapid patio]

@tight lodge look at this rgb vs narrowband

the detail and color wow

[tight lodge]

sharper

[vapid patio]

wayyy sharper

[tight lodge]

depends what kind of NB as well XD

[vapid patio]

Ha and oiii

4hr

[tight lodge]

You use Pix, Right?

[vapid patio]

yep

[tight lodge]

aye... imma send you the data in a minute

[vapid patio]

ok

[tight lodge]

i'm stuffing my face because i haven't ate anything today . Amazing to be an adult🤣

[tight lodge]

There you go

[vapid patio]

hehehehehe

[tight lodge]

make it worth it

[vapid patio]

i will try my best

only hard part is image alignment but thats still not even that hard

[vapid patio]

the ha added so much signal i didnt even really have to denoise

@tight lodge not to shabby

[tight lodge]

It really got damn sharp😲

Do you need some OIII as well?

[vapid patio]

YES

THATD BE SICK

[vapid patio]

Crap ton more signal

And the benefit of being narrowband

[tight lodge]

and both mono

[vapid patio]

Exactly

Next is narrowband filters for me

[tight lodge]

There you go 😄

Lmao

[vapid patio]

@tight lodge whats the weather thing

[tight lodge]

I sent it somwhere and when i wanted to send you the data, the link got sent as well

But that's what i use for checking the weather before going out

[vapid patio]

ohh ok all good

oii data is a little rough

did you calabrate it>

[tight lodge]

no

it's a single frame LUL

[vapid patio]

haha ok

well not bad then

pain to edit for sure but aye looks great

could do a little more masking to get a cleaner background but eh

[tight lodge]

@frosty shard @harsh matrix do you guys want to throw in some data just for experimentation?

[frosty shard]

I would if I had more :( but when I do you got it

I do have my M11 data #1377449917919789138

[tight lodge]

I contributed with only 5 minutes

[frosty shard]

But it's probably not all that interesting

[harsh matrix]

what did the longer term average look like

[vapid patio]

1.00 flat

[harsh matrix]

looks pretty darn good

[frosty shard]

Well I also have my M16 data from earlier: #1371584077442056314 and I can send you a stack of H-alpha (about 1 hour I think)

[harsh matrix]

not great but not bad

are you shooting with the reducer?

[vapid patio]

best i can work with

yep

[harsh matrix]

ight

that's not nearly as bad then

[tight lodge]

I don't have any data on m16

[vapid patio]

i sent all my files in a google doc if you wanna check them over

[vapid patio]

this new vs old

[tight lodge]

Didn't you already posted them?

[harsh matrix]

i do see some slight evidence of it, but i think you can do a bit better about it, WR136 is magenta

[tight lodge]

Here😂

[vapid patio]

oh did that aswell

[harsh matrix]

if you can pull out more color in the stars

[vapid patio]

dont have a good reference

[harsh matrix]

wdym?

[tight lodge]

SPCC?

[vapid patio]

of a rgb image of the target

[vapid patio]

huh

[tight lodge]

Spectropohotometry Color Calibration

[harsh matrix]

did you not color calibrate the image?

[frosty shard]

That reminds me, I need to get spectrophotometric data on my filters

[vapid patio]

its spectrophotometric color calibration

[tight lodge]

I corrected it

[tight lodge]

Optolong filters are already in the list

[frosty shard]

I'm using Touptek filters

[frosty shard]

But one professor at my university is also an astrophotographer and offered to measure my filters with his lab's spectrophotometer

[tight lodge]

Well that's lucky

[vapid patio]

Oh good idea I gotta do that

[harsh matrix]

oh snap

id be curious how close to spec they are

[vapid patio]

i wonder if cuiv has done a review on them

[harsh matrix]

not yet

[tight lodge]

He said he will test the LRGBSHO from touptek... but judging by his last video, he might have more important stuff to take care of🥲

[frosty shard]

huh I wonder if I can get the spectrophotometric data to him/if he would include that in the video

[tight lodge]

I mean, if you get a paper that proves the test, maybe that would help

[frosty shard]

I will be providing the data to the SIRIL project for its SPCC implementation

[vapid patio]

@tight lodge @harsh matrix What we think for some good Ha filters

Not ready for a SHO set and just want Ha

Maybe a oiii set

[frosty shard]

Why not a full SHO set? Cost?

[tight lodge]

I got the Svbony 5μm Hα filter

[frosty shard]

In technical terms I think a 5 μm bandpass is a big chungus

[tight lodge]

Have you seen Baader?

[frosty shard]

I mean I don't think they meausre bandpasses in micrometers

[harsh matrix]

svbony ha is nice and cheap but you will get halos which is pretty cringe for an H alpha filter

[vapid patio]

Yeah

[vapid patio]

I’ll look it up

[tight lodge]

From personal experience, the Hα doesn't have those horrific halos. It does have a faint halo around really bright stars, but nothing horrible

[harsh matrix]

yeah theyre pretty tame

tbh theyre hard to identify with an RC for one specific reason

CO modulation

that actually covers them up

sadr halo in ha with the filter

on my redcat

of course my redcat is so darn sharp now that the star itself is tiny compared to the halo, but even then, the halo isnt bloating the star and it's relatively diffuse

after 3 hours and 40 minutes btw

so really not too bad

[vapid patio]

How did you make it sharper? Lol

[harsh matrix]

sent it to WO for them to actually collimate the thing

[vapid patio]

Tf you can do that

Free?

[harsh matrix]

i did it under warranty

on the premise that i got a defective unit

i had to fight tooth and nail for them to agree to fix it though

[tight lodge]

This is my Hα halo around Alnitak. I used an APS-C sensor and a telescope that was not properly colimated for some reason

[harsh matrix]

yeah at least the halos are constrained and not wild

[tight lodge]

Wait... I'm dumb. That's the OIII

[harsh matrix]

oops

[tight lodge]

This is the Hα.

Yeah... DSLR just did not cut it

[harsh matrix]

that's horrible signal

😭

[tight lodge]

Mighty power of DSLR

[vapid patio]

Was it actually broken or you just wanted it to be sharper lol

[vapid patio]

well, I mean they have a builtin UV/it filter

[harsh matrix]

the left was the scope as is since i got it, right is after i sent it to them

you can see in the left example, the centroid (most focused point of light) is offset to the left

[tight lodge]

I removed both of my filters. LFP-1 and 2

[harsh matrix]

no blurx ofc

[vapid patio]

Ouch wow

[harsh matrix]

it was actually broken

that's center of the frame too

for both

there should be NO aberration there of any sort

there's some slight tilt in the right image but i can at least fix that

[vapid patio]

Hm ok

[vapid patio]

Yeah, no that’s pretty bad

[harsh matrix]

the difference was even more obvious in subs and in the focus of the stars

[vapid patio]

Did they send you a new sharpness graph thing?

[harsh matrix]

no

never got one of those with this scope

[tight lodge]

Remember. The reflectors are the kings

[harsh matrix]

just a warranty card

top left corner was really bad

😭

btw 2x drizzling with the scope in that state just made everything blurrier

i got no resolution increase either

meanwhile, post collimation, 2x drizzle meant it was rivaling an SVX in resolution and sharpness

a 102 SVX

[vapid patio]

😢

[vapid patio]

Dang thats crazy

[frosty shard]

Man when I was building my rig I thought I'd just do astrophotography with a DSLR and call it a day. I am so glad I did not go that route.

(I thought with a DSLR it would be more cost effective if I wanted to do terrestrial photography)

But nah, astro comes first

Also I can check out DSLRs from my university library

[vapid patio]

Same here and I realize they had that filter in front of it and it would be useless

Then I found the cheapest camera I could

[frosty shard]

I might still borrow one for lunar but otherwise I'm so glad I got a cooled mono camera

[harsh matrix]

indoor flats work again

[vapid patio]

How do you do them

Light panel?

[harsh matrix]

i put a white T-shirt over the aperture, point it at zenith, and take them in a room with consistent lighting

normally i let the ambient light coming from outside do the work

[vapid patio]

Ah ok i see

[frosty shard]

What kind of exposure times do you need?

I bought myself a tracing panel for $21 on Amazon and it's a godsend

[vapid patio]

@harsh matrix I feel like this is a you kind of question.

where do I put my dew heaters? Main mirror secondary mirror.?

I don’t have a heated do shield since Astro zap is not shipping to the US really

*Dew

[harsh matrix]

I just tell the Nina flat wizard to do the work

I don't bother doing flats manually anymore because I messed them up too often in the past and the flat wizard makes it so easy

[harsh matrix]

You can wrap a dew strap around the secondary mirror shield and route the cable away if you're creative about it.

The primary should not need a dew heater because its so far down the tube

[vapid patio]

OK, thanks

Will this do anything as it is on top of the Dow shield?

[harsh matrix]

doubt it

[harsh matrix]

Lagoon after flats

[vapid patio]

Doubt it will do anything?

[harsh matrix]

yeah

[harsh matrix]

amazing

[vapid patio]

DAMN

Also any clue as to why its so one sided?

[frosty shard]

I use the flat wizard as well but I find I rarely need exposures longer than 2 seconds with my narrowband/IR filters

[harsh matrix]

Lagoon in HaRGB

[tight lodge]

Don't you dare to clown my filters

[vapid patio]

I had 35nm oiii 😭

[tight lodge]

Probably to cover Hβ as well

[vapid patio]

@harsh matrix I found a break through

Were I put my mini pc and wifi thing completely changed a sude if my scope when moving it

Now I have my mini pc on the bottom of my Losmandy plate

[vapid patio]

Hb?

[tight lodge]

Yes

It's like Hα but blue

[vapid patio]

Hydrogen beta?

Weird haha

[tight lodge]

Well, I like to use proper leter.

Like instead of nm I use μm

[vapid patio]

Nerd

[tight lodge]

If I'm referring to the hydrogen atom, I don't write it H1 but I write it H¹

[tight lodge]

[vapid patio]

I dont think my phone can do that haha

[tight lodge]

I use a Samsung

[vapid patio]

Fancy

[tight lodge]

I can do lots of things with this keyboard

I can write fractions as single characters

Like if I want to say 1 and a half, I don't have to write it as 1 1/2, I can write it 1½

[harsh matrix]

Nice

[vapid patio]

I WISH DANG

[harsh matrix]

@vapid patio can you send an unprocessed stack or frame of what your field looks like with that reducer

[vapid patio]

Uhhh

Let me look in my screenshots

[harsh matrix]

And/or @prime sequoia

[frosty shard]

Wait I should point out that μm is micrometers and nm is nanometers (1000x smaller)

[harsh matrix]

I mean the CCD67x or whatever its called

[prime sequoia]

I have been summoned

[harsh matrix]

Yeah

[harsh matrix]

You have the astrotech CCD67X reducer or whatever it is for your RC right?

[prime sequoia]

Yes

The last image I worked on with it

28 hours

I have the gso reducer the .75x one

[vapid patio]

Do you have a concern?

[harsh matrix]

Not really

I just want to see if it has more or less field curvature than my current reducer

[vapid patio]

ok will do oneeeeeee sec

[harsh matrix]

I can't seem to get the corners with my reducer all that good and I'm pretty sure its not collimation at this point...

A bit concerning for a tiny sensor like my 533 tbh

[vapid patio]

dont mind my star trails

less star trails

figured out what was causing my balance issue

the mini pc on top and my wifi thing screwed it up somehow

now they have the same balance with the counter weights in the same place

[harsh matrix]

I saw

[vapid patio]

the video or the fix?

[harsh matrix]

The right corners aren't perfect either

[harsh matrix]

Fix

Might just go ahead and get the Apex-L if I can justify the cost rn

[vapid patio]

same star trails lol

im not the best dude for this haha

[vapid patio]

oh ok yeah so it looks cleaner now tbh so win win

[vapid patio]

AND i am due for a collimation tbh

[frosty shard]

That is one expensive reducer holy crap

[harsh matrix]

Well no i can see what's a star trail and what isn't

[frosty shard]

Speaking of holy crap. I might be able to pull the rig out tonight

[vapid patio]

ouch yeah

[harsh matrix]

Yes but there's on for sale on CN thats not as expensive

[vapid patio]

the direction right?

[harsh matrix]

I'm not going to buy it new if possible

[harsh matrix]

Yes

The general shape bias in the stars

[vapid patio]

seems pretty consistent no?

[frosty shard]

Starizona does reducers right at least

[harsh matrix]

Yes and no

[frosty shard]

You're talking about the Apertura reducer right

[harsh matrix]

I can see signs that the reducer is too far from the sensor, in a back focus sense

Though thats not something you should concern yourself with.

Since you're using it as intended

[harsh matrix]

Yes

The top right and bottom left corners aren't all that great but the center, top left, and bottom right are all good which is weird

I feel like if it was tilt due to collimation, there'd be some sort of bias visible in the rest of the field, but there isn't as far as I can tell

Plus I'm getting that 571 soon, whenever it ships , so i want good to great corners if possible regardless of sensor size.

[frosty shard]

I wonder if it's a combination of tilt and astigmatism

[harsh matrix]

Having visible distortion in the corners on a 533 is not very nice.

[vapid patio]

heres a better all 4 corners

[harsh matrix]

I'm wondering the same

There's definitely astigmatism

[vapid patio]

me?

[harsh matrix]

I think even across the field, but its so incredibly minor that I'm having a VERY difficult time tuning it out completely.

[harsh matrix]

No me

[vapid patio]

oh haha sorry

[harsh matrix]

Looks like a combination of distortion due to the reducer and signs that its time to collimate imo.

[vapid patio]

oh also why do i have a extra spike?

[vapid patio]

yeah sadly a collimation is in my future

and reducer problem? im right on the money at a 0.66 reduction

[harsh matrix]

Either a spider put a web across the aperture of your scope during the night, or you shot through a tree, powerline, or roof.

[harsh matrix]

Yeah thats what I was saying, you're using it as intended.

That means they didnt intend for the reducer to have a perfect field.

Probably the same case for me imo

[vapid patio]

I have none of those

[vapid patio]

rc are weird lol

[vapid patio]

maybe spider

OH I KNOW WHAT IT IS

OUCH

lets say my mirror has some... imperfections...

[harsh matrix]

[frosty shard]

...what do you mean

[oblique sun]

i bit it

https://tenor.com/view/cat-cord-bite-dies-dies-from-cringe-gif-14516810518005393867

[frosty shard]

Oh god the backlash issue is still there

[tight lodge]

To me it feels like the tripod

But for your sanity, I will try to measure the DEC backlash with a needle micrometer

[frosty shard]

Yeah, I think that's the issue. The only other thing I can think of is that I did drop the mount once (oops)

Not onto something hard. I dropped it on its storage box and dented it.

Guiding is at 0.6" atm though

[tight lodge]

That's good.

[tight lodge]

[frosty shard]

I actually set the tripod on concrete this time

[frosty shard]

Also I still recommend replacing the stock screws, the setup feels WAY more solid

Alright, before I take this thing down I've decided to run a backlash test on the opposite side of the meridian

And I've already noticed one thing

My polar alignment is much worse on the opposite of the meridian

And guess what

The backlash is way, way better

It's like 1/3 of the amount on the east side of the pier

[tight lodge]

Bingo.

There's your backlash

You could do a test. Remove the pier extension and try the guiding on a random patch on the sky

[frosty shard]

Oh my god, I think I found the problem. The pier extension was not secured

[tight lodge]

[tight lodge]

That screams disaster

[frosty shard]

Actually I tightened it again and it doesn't feel any different, but that may not be sensitive enough

[frosty shard]

Finally, got a chance to add S-II

Screw JPEG, let's do lossless

I keep making things too dark

Needs more stretch

[frosty shard]

that might be a little overcooked

[tight lodge]

Needs more SII and OIII

[vapid patio]

it really needs cleaned'

[vapid patio]

No thats how sho looks before any cleaning

Same with the stars sometimes

[thorny path]

I love my svx and I’m thinking on another scope with high FL to compliment it

For an RC, should one get it with a reducer ?

[brisk swift]

rc6

[frosty shard]

If you mean integration, yeah, it's just 30 minutes in either channel.
If you mean stretching, GREEEEEEEEEEEEEN

[tight lodge]

Make it so green that it reverses global warming

[frosty shard]

Okay but I do like the tinting variations of S-II and O-III.

[frosty shard]

alright, now I'm starting to like this

[harsh matrix]

With your seeing and a 533 i would

[harsh matrix]

There you go

[frosty shard]

turns out my processing is better when I get sleep

[vapid patio]

@harsh matrix Can I collimate inside?

[vapid patio]

Could you send data?

I am a sho master

1:30hr of data

[frosty shard]

once I'm back at my home PC, yup

note that my O-III and S-II data are really not that good

[vapid patio]

Nah its fine trust its a crap ton of masking

[frosty shard]

#1380301565692481618 Have at it

[harsh matrix]

Not really

And not to the level of accuracy necessary to correct the error you do have since its not very large

[harsh matrix]

@frosty shard im assuming your mount is properly balanced in dec, but if it isnt, that will cause huge backlash issues for you

[frosty shard]

I think I need to get a counterweight for my OTA, I don't even know if I can just mount it on the saddle in a balanced fashion as-is

the Wave 150i has a pretty small saddle

[harsh matrix]

so you havent actually loosened the clutch to check balance before?

[frosty shard]

Yeah I didn't want to screw with the screw lmao

[harsh matrix]

getting a counterweight for the dec is a good idea for sure

ah

yeah that's probably the cause of your backlash right now

[frosty shard]

But now that I'm confident that I can tighten it properly with the new bolt, I can test and fix that

[harsh matrix]

when i balanced the dec correctly with my RC8, the dec went from responsive but not quick, to very twitchy

oh and some backlash to virtually no backlash

[frosty shard]

I just need to figure out the best way to attach some weights

probably a Losmandy clamp of some kind

[harsh matrix]

https://www.highpointscientific.com/adm-accessories-dual-series-dovetail-counterweight-dvcw this is what i grabbed

[tight lodge]

https://a.aliexpress.com/_EGWtA4i

[frosty shard]

I got a 404

[tight lodge]

Did they ban AliExpress in USA?

[tight lodge]

This is what was in that link

[frosty shard]

wait something is up because it seems like the page loads and then it gives me a 404?

[tight lodge]

@frosty shard I measured the backlash for you😅

Both screws locked

One unlocked

Both unlocked

[frosty shard]

By "unlocked" do you mean just loose and not completely removed?

[tight lodge]

Loosened

[frosty shard]

So that's what, ±4 µm backlash when properly tightened? Nice

I think I just need a counterweight for my OTA

[tight lodge]

yeah, brobably the pier kinda leans in the same direction as the OTA

[frosty shard]

I'll check all those connections but I also think there's a decent imbalance in Dec

And one of the things you have to worry about with strain wave gearing is flex in the elastic spline

Which actually explains the shape of the backlash curve I'm seeing

[tight lodge]

so it was 4µm over 4cm off the center. so at 40cm is a backlash of 0.04mm
Well... more like a spline flex than components actually moving. so the flex will mean that it doesn't matter in the end that you have a harmonic mount. you still have to balance it for the best results

[frosty shard]

The flex makes the backlash graph look somewhat curved which is what I'm seeing in the PHD2 graphs

[tight lodge]

I figured that the whole 4µm results in about ±20 arcseconds of error

[frosty shard]

PHD2 measured about 40 arcseconds of backlash on one side of the pier and 15 on the other

[vapid patio]

Whats this

Nerd

[tight lodge]

damn... i never trust my math and somehow i got so close to actual values?

[frosty shard]

Oh I missed that congratulations!

[tight lodge]

naaaahhhh

[vapid patio]

WHAT IS IT

I NEED TO KNOW

[tight lodge]

I calculated the backlash of the WAVE 150i

[vapid patio]

It even has any? That’s surprising

[vapid patio]

Is it bad? Or barely any

[tight lodge]

20arcseconds of backlash?

that's good

[frosty shard]

It's not technically backlash, I think it's flex in the spline judging from the shape of the backlash graph in PHD2

@tight lodge if you ever get the chance, I wonder what it'll look like if you replace the stock Dec bolts with M6x12 ones that need an Allen key to tighten

My saddle feels way more solid after that

[vapid patio]

Like 0.20?

[tight lodge]

yes

[vapid patio]

Ahh ok

[vapid patio]

Oh ok thats great

[frosty shard]

Wait 20 arcseconds or 0.20 arcseconds?

[tight lodge]

20 arcseconds. what Kit-Kat wrote was 0.20 arc minutes 😄 The PHD2 display XD

[frosty shard]

Ah

[tight lodge]

that's quite impressive ngl

[vapid patio]

How can i measure mine 😭

Gonna be 20arc hours

[tight lodge]

Well... you will need couple of measuring tools. Something that will help you with some trigonometry

What I used in that clip was a dial indicator mounted on the RA axis and used that as a reference

In my case I moved the dial indicator about 4cm away from the center of the DEC axis. Then I measured how much it moved an note it. Then you can multiply the values by let's say 10 to make calculations a bit easier and you do some trigonometry to find θ in arcseconds

Or you can let PHD2 do it for you😅

[vapid patio]

I think i like that option more 😭

Why didn't you?

[tight lodge]

i promissed brainandforce that i will measure "the backlash" in teh WAVE 150i

[vapid patio]

But how is manual better than phd2 doing it?

[tight lodge]

you can see what causes the backlash 😄

[vapid patio]

HOW

i mean backlash is just the space in between the gears when switching direction right?

[tight lodge]

Well, PHD will tell you that there's backlash, but it can't tell you what causes it.

[vapid patio]

and what did the manual test tell you it was?

[tight lodge]

Yes, but the WAVE 150i is a harmonic drive, so it has no gears

[vapid patio]

oh yeah

[tight lodge]

that told me the flexure in the flex spline. in the case of Brainandforce there might be too much flexure because of the unbalanced load

[vapid patio]

oh ok

and whats a flex spine?

[tight lodge]

But, still i will mostly blame the tripo as well

[vapid patio]

spline

[vapid patio]

yeah, with my GTI it flexes like crazy, but i don't care as it's very wide

[tight lodge]

The flex spline is like the ticking heart of the harmonic drive, The red flexible gear, that's the flex spline

[vapid patio]

ohhh yes! of course caught me off guard

[tight lodge]

so yes, Harmonic drives have incredibly high torque and very high reduction, the reason why they don't have backlash is because of the way that the teeth mesh together.

[vapid patio]

very good design. plan to sell my cgem if I can't fix it, and I think I can with what I just fixed "big deal, I think" seems to have been hyper tuned as it has no friction "stick" with nothing on it, it just spins in circles.

if i can get it good I wont go any bigger lol

[tight lodge]

that's the type of mount you want a tad unbalanced. Basically you want to constantly preload the backlash

[vapid patio]

yep a little back heavy on dec and east heavy on ra if pointing per say at cygnus

[tight lodge]

That sounds about right

[vapid patio]

cant wait to try this

and gotta do some surgery and take a look at my gears

saw something questionable

[tight lodge]

What was it?

[vapid patio]

let me see if i can find a photo

i wondered why it always sounded like when it hit a point it wound hit somthing

its not lube its hard btw

this might have not been it but it def is worth looking at

[tight lodge]

that lube needs to go

[vapid patio]

wdym

[tight lodge]

if you take it apart, is good to replace the lube as well

[vapid patio]

yes I need to figure out what it uses

[vapid patio]

I'm scared 😭

[tight lodge]

just take it slowly

[vapid patio]

I'm fineeee

Repacked my bearings

[harsh matrix]

Looks horrifying

Like watching your family member get operated on during open heart surgery

[vapid patio]

Might be no more cgem for me

[harsh matrix]

Why

[vapid patio]

https://tenor.com/view/ultrasad-gif-23310565

[vapid patio]

its fine now all but a ticking sound

theres so much info that goes with what I said but short story I think its fine

[vapid patio]

cgem is all back together what a pain

redoing gear backlash and worm gear backlash is a painnnnnnnnnn

[harsh matrix]

Yuppers

[vapid patio]

https://cdn.discordapp.com/attachments/1133160663271866409/1375929964536397887/togif-1.gif

[frosty shard]

If you're not using a median filter on your guide cam – my god do it

I'm seeing more stars than if someone whacked me in the head wirh a baseball bat

[harsh matrix]

what's a median filter?

[frosty shard]

In PHD2 guiding settings you can use a noise reduction method, and by default none is used. But switch over to the 3x3 median filter option

I have a dark library but the median filter eliminates dead pixels if you don't have one

And it massively boosts star SNR

[harsh matrix]

oh im already using a dark library

it's OP

[frosty shard]

Guiding at 0.4" tonight

[frosty shard]

My god it's dropped down to 0.32"...

[harsh matrix]

[vapid patio]

https://cdn.discordapp.com/attachments/1133160663271866409/1375929964536397887/togif-1.gif

[vapid patio]

Whats funny and kinda sad I think i like the framing of my redcat more 😭

I maybe wanna get a 130pds tbh

It’s around what fl i truly want. 600-800

[frosty shard]

Last night's data

[harsh matrix]

hawt

[frosty shard]

Looks like I need to recollimate

[harsh matrix]

Yeah

I don't think its a huge adjustment that needs to be made though

Looks pretty small

[frosty shard]

First mosaic

[vapid patio]

How can you tell?

[harsh matrix]

There's a very subtle bias in the core to edge of the stars across the frame

[vapid patio]

Ah i see

[vapid patio]

How bad is mine then?

[harsh matrix]

Don't know since you use BlurX

[vapid patio]

Ah

Will send a sub in a sec

[frosty shard]

My data is only stretched

[vapid patio]

Ok

[vapid patio]

Will you even be able to tell since I have star trails lol

[harsh matrix]

It would be very hard tbh

[vapid patio]

No worries Collimation is easy fix, mount no so much 😭🙏

Gotta pick a struggle

[harsh matrix]

Did your tune up not work?

Also was the RA drive damaged in any way?

[vapid patio]

Wdym drive?

[vapid patio]

Gotta wait for a clear night

Sounds a lot better to be honest once I just did the worm gear mesh

[harsh matrix]

Worm gear, the rest of the gear drive, etc.

[harsh matrix]

Good

[harsh matrix]

Rip

[vapid patio]

Oh ok them no not at all it looked amazing for being from 2007 🥲

[harsh matrix]

Okay thats good.

In that case, tuning the meshing for the gears may give you way better results if initial testing isnt as good as we hope it will be.

[vapid patio]

Yes, and now that I know how to do it it’s easy to do it on the fly

[vapid patio]

It is 1am i wake up and of course it randomly clears up

https://cdn.discordapp.com/attachments/1133160663271866409/1375929964536397887/togif-1.gif

[thorny path]

https://www.cloudynights.com/classifieds/item/411940-need-it-gone-by-0610-apertura-rc6-aluminium-with-apertura-075x-reducer/

[harsh matrix]

How much he asking for it?

[thorny path]

180 USD

[harsh matrix]

Sort of sounds like a steal imo

[frosty shard]

@tight lodge I think this is as good as I can get my SHO moon image

SCNR actually came in handy for making the yellow color more natural

[tight lodge]

For real it looks like mineral moon

[frosty shard]

I mean it is I just bumped up the saturation to accomplish that

The issue is getting all of the subs registered. You need a diffeomorphic image registration tool to properly align the frames

[ripe crystal]

At least the collimation is off on only one panel

[frosty shard]

I'm going to fix that tonight

[frosty shard]

Alright kids it's collimation time

[tight lodge]

From 1 to 10, how illegal is that laser?

[frosty shard]

A big fat 0. It's certified at 4.6 mW

[tight lodge]

Idk if that counts when pointing it in the sky

[frosty shard]

As long as you don't hit a plane you're good here lol

[tight lodge]

what if the plane finds itself in the way? I heard that military aircrafts like to sent a gift back XD

[frosty shard]

That is something I have to be concerned about since I live near a medium sized airport

[tight lodge]

i have 1 medium and 2 GA airports around me XD

[frosty shard]

But a single laser strike isn't as big of a deal as deliberately tracking a plane to disrupt the pilot

Either way I keep my eye out all the time and just use it when aiming

[tight lodge]

that's true

[harsh matrix]

[frosty shard]

@harsh matrix I think I found the cause of my focus issues: astigmatism

[harsh matrix]

likely

[frosty shard]

I tried collimating by eye last night and it's abundantly clear that evaluating the Airy disks makes this much more obvious on-axis

I decided I'll pull out the imaging train to use the DSI method properly, but I'm also interested in writing my own supplement for those collimating by eye

Also you can see the CO modulation effects pretty easily

[harsh matrix]

Interesting

[vapid patio]

Well tonight is clear around uhhh 1am

So tonight is am I screwed or is it going on cloudy nights

[vapid patio]

All ready to go wish me luck gang 🙏

[harsh matrix]

Imagine getting to image 😭

Can you see the Milky Way in your backyard?

[vapid patio]

Moon sadly

But no moon yes

[vapid patio]

Truly, I’m not lol just wanna see if my mounts destroyed or not 🔥 🔥

[harsh matrix]

Man wtf

Im jelly

https://tenor.com/view/ora-gif-23466411

[harsh matrix]

[vapid patio]

I took this photo with my phone a couple days ago

To be fair, my phone can’t take a Milky Way photo to save its life

And it does some hideous denoise

[harsh matrix]

Ans you can still tell what it is

[vapid patio]

You can even see the little star cluster

[harsh matrix]

Yeah you can see M24 and M8 easy

[vapid patio]

Yeah so cant wait to do a milkyway night with my normal camera

[frosty shard]

Well I'm getting the rain over here so I can't fix collimation tonight

[harsh matrix]

My phone has been saying "rain possible" all day and it has not done anything

[vapid patio]

Too real like is it gonna or not 💔

[tight lodge]

Take your rig outside. You'll see that starts to rain immediately

[vapid patio]

@harsh matrix Whats funny is i dont think its any better or any worse 😅

These thin clouds wont hop off

So far so good I can't lie 🤷‍♂️

[harsh matrix]

not a bad thing tbf

[vapid patio]

It’s great if anything shows that I didn’t break anything

There's a old one

New one

HOLY

DONT MIND THE BIG STARS IN THE PHOTO ITS OLD FROM EARILER

[harsh matrix]

wow that's awful guiding

[vapid patio]

Oh

[vapid patio]

Wow yeah compared to my old charts this is really baf

What should I do?

Also

come in guiding assistant it always looks a good bit better but compared to actual guiding it’s horrible

[harsh matrix]

what is your min mo on RA and Dec?

[vapid patio]

One sec

I'm running a guiding assistant

@harsh matrix Its for Ra 0.39 and DEC 0.60

[harsh matrix]

that might be guiding within the limits you have then

might be good to try cutting those in half at least

how long are your guide exposures?

[vapid patio]

But too low it can chase right?

2.5s

[harsh matrix]

depends

[harsh matrix]

should be fine to drop it for sure

might be worth dropping guide exposure length too to see what kind of effect it has

[vapid patio]

Ok

To what?

I did 1

[harsh matrix]

1/1.5

maybe 2 if it chases

[vapid patio]

What does chaseing look like?

[harsh matrix]

you can counteract chasing by extending the guide exposure length

[vapid patio]

Up down up down up down I'm guessing

[harsh matrix]

lots of adjustments going in the opposite direction constantly

[vapid patio]

Yeah

[harsh matrix]

right now it just looks like your mount isnt receiving enough guide pulses to counteract drift

[vapid patio]

What should I do for the minimum move?

And I have heard that backlash compensation can sometimes mess stuff up

[harsh matrix]

try about half for both RA and Dec

id personally drop the RA min mo as low as 0.12 just to see what happens

[vapid patio]

Ok

Both?

[harsh matrix]

half their current values on both, yes

[vapid patio]

It gets all choppy

[harsh matrix]

send a picture

[vapid patio]

Gotta let the old stuff get out of frame

I mean eh its fine not super choppy now

[harsh matrix]

that's a significant improvement

[vapid patio]

Yes I would say so

its still such a RA thing

Ra is protective PEC btw

[harsh matrix]

from there honestly, id experiment with various combos of min mo and exposure times until you find something that gets the guiding as low as possible

[harsh matrix]

predictive?

[vapid patio]

Oh yes sorry

[harsh matrix]

doing small intervals of like 0.02 to the min mo at most

and doing 0.5s variations on exposure times

[vapid patio]

Idk if my guide cam can find stars that short tbh

[harsh matrix]

i think the min mo sweep spot for my eqm 35 is 0.16 or 0.12 at 1 second guide exposures

[harsh matrix]

it's either that or trailed stars

you wont have a problem in the galactic plane

[vapid patio]

Fair

[harsh matrix]

you will if you try shooting galaxies far from the disc of the galaxy

[vapid patio]

I need a new guide cam tbh bigger more sensitive sensor

[harsh matrix]

for sure

[vapid patio]

Atee we are in 0.76 now

Min move for ra is now 0.5

Wait whoops

@harsh matrix Holy

0.56 🙏

I think there was never anything wrong with my mount probably just with my guiding settings

[harsh matrix]

probably

but a tune up is worth it every time imo

[harsh matrix]

that looks great

[vapid patio]

And back up to 0.76 😢

[harsh matrix]

no big spikes

[vapid patio]

More like a idk what I'm doing up

[harsh matrix]

it's going to vary, that's a given

[vapid patio]

No none at all

[harsh matrix]

did you change something before it went back up?

[vapid patio]

Nope

And back down to .60

[harsh matrix]

that's good then

id honestly just leave it there

[vapid patio]

thank you a lot though

[harsh matrix]

that's more than good enough for your sampling i think

[vapid patio]

I think so let me figure what is ideal

I think the reason it was so bad at first is because everything was a little bit Off because the mount had been rebuilt

[harsh matrix]

it could have been

PPEC gets messed up and thrown off after a big change to the mount

so that will have to relearn as well

[vapid patio]

I redid mine

Also

My collimation is pretty bad looking at it now with normal stars

[harsh matrix]

i mean the computer has to relearn the the period

[harsh matrix]

riiiiip

so that's next on the chopping block

[vapid patio]

Doesn’t it relearn when you switch targets?

[harsh matrix]

shouldnt

[vapid patio]

Yayy 🥲

[harsh matrix]

i think it has to figure out where in the cycle it is

[vapid patio]

Yeah not too sure

I feel like a new camera will help big time

[harsh matrix]

it will

[vapid patio]

That's next on the spending chain

[harsh matrix]

💯

time to get crescent neb daytar, right?

[vapid patio]

What? Haha

My filters come in today technically so nothing fun till then

Can’t shoot with all this moon

[harsh matrix]

[vapid patio]

Oh neb data

Sir yes sirc🫡

[harsh matrix]

[vapid patio]

Leave some detail for the rest of us

yes sirre

[frosty shard]

What filter is this

[vapid patio]

Sv227

@tight lodge has same one

[harsh matrix]

i have them too

[vapid patio]

Ohhhhh

So good for the price

[frosty shard]

Ah just standard narrowband

[harsh matrix]

yeah they do well for the price

Ha halos drive me mad though

[vapid patio]

Its a hit and miss so I've heard

[vapid patio]

Whats not standard narrowband?

[vapid patio]

@harsh matrix Nerdy question

Does your mount use gears? “Build up to the question”

[harsh matrix]

My AM5N does not

My EQM-35 does

[vapid patio]

Oh, for some reason, I thought you had an HEQ5

[vapid patio]

OK, well for that amount does it have wobble in the RA axis between the worm gear and the big one it spins around

Actually, it might be irrelevant just because it’s probably geared a whole lot different

[tight lodge]

Did someone say, Filters?

[tight lodge]

They are not too bad tho. I mean if you look at Sadr or Alnitak, yeah... they do appear

[vapid patio]

And you use a fast scope

[vapid patio]

Some of them are out of the box

Cheater

[tight lodge]

That too

[tight lodge]

Yes, because they are inside the EFW😂

[vapid patio]

i mea like the cases

makes the box stack look bigger

badder 35nm???

[tight lodge]

Beginner mistake

[vapid patio]

yeah ouch i didn't even know they sold those

@tight lodge you see my dm?

[harsh matrix]

my particular copy gets them on stars which are not very bright

like mag 7 stars

[tight lodge]

I did😅

[vapid patio]

Well come on

Anyways my guiding is

[tight lodge]

[tight lodge]

WR-136 doesn't have halos

[tight lodge]

It was only one outside of the box

[vapid patio]

i realized that

[tight lodge]

Amogos, what should I attempt to image tonight?

[vapid patio]

well if you are going milkyway targets i say. 1. m16 standard. 2. lagoon core is so nice @harsh matrix knows. 3. north American wall is amazing. 4. elephant trunk is not bad.

[tight lodge]

Elephant trunk might be interesting. Lagoon and Eagle are right next to the moon

[vapid patio]

forgot its moon season

[vapid patio]

dont forget though wizard is near. also bubble nebula and pacman all really amazing targets in narrowband

broadband not so much

[tight lodge]

Broadband under full moon?... no thanks XD

[vapid patio]

moons low and target is other side of the sky but yeah narrowband for the win

dont forget veil

[tight lodge]

i'm gonna wait a bit for veil, to be higher in the sky

[vapid patio]

fair

[tight lodge]

plus, i did it before

i'm gonna try elephant trunk nebula

[vapid patio]

hehe good choice

sho?

[tight lodge]

heck yeah

[vapid patio]

its sick in sho

[tight lodge]

Everything in SHO is sick XD

but i'm gonna start with Ha. a bit backwards of how i normally image.

my EFW has this sequence LSHORGB

[frosty shard]

Honestly I've been loving shooting mono H-alpha, you get a cool image immediately

[harsh matrix]

im going to get a late start on my summer projects 😭

[frosty shard]

I'll also do S-II when the moon phase is unfavorable and save O-III for when it's out of the way

[frosty shard]

Weather? Or other commitments

[harsh matrix]

weather

[frosty shard]

Same and it's mostly Canada's fault for burning

[frosty shard]

So I figured out how to collimate my RC correctly: make someone else do it

A fellow RC owner in my area offered to let me use his Skywave license

I actually want to see if I can get it dialed in on my own if the weather permits, but still

[harsh matrix]

[vapid patio]

@harsh matrix when you go to calibrate your guiding do you point where it wants you to or nah

if yes does it really make any differnce

[harsh matrix]

yes

[harsh matrix]

yes

[vapid patio]

ok i will try

I usally just point it where im going to imaging and ignore it

[frosty shard]

Rick Wayne (fewayne on Cloudy Nights), I'm going to his place on Saturday

Also @harsh matrix you might find this thread super informative: https://www.cloudynights.com/topic/840516-gso-rc8-mirror-details/?hl=ritchey#entry12907378

[harsh matrix]

oh boy

my brain doesnt want to learn today so reading this may not sink in right now

[frosty shard]

Fair enough

My main interest is that I'm curious how much you could optimize the GSO design for visual without compromising it photographically

The main tweak being reduction of the secondary size without significantly compromising illumination for an APS-C sensor

[vapid patio]

[harsh matrix]

btw, when i say good seeming in summer, this is what i mean

[harsh matrix]

redcat

[thorny path]

One thing to consider is that it seems your PA is off a bit

Unless you did that on purpose so the dec only goes in one direction

[vapid patio]

How could you tell from the graph?

And yes it was off on accident

I had done a bad drift alignment from the clouds

[vapid patio]

What about you?? Time to bring it out again

[harsh matrix]

Im bringing it out whenever I actually get my 571.

[vapid patio]

gonna be super wide feield

[harsh matrix]

Of course

Thats the goal

[vapid patio]

what targets you plan?

[harsh matrix]

Sadr region

my eyes are firmly set on that right now

[vapid patio]

like you wanna get the whole thing?

[harsh matrix]

I really want to shoot it in broadband

[vapid patio]

https://tenor.com/view/wildfireuv-gif-26390378

[harsh matrix]

butterfly neb maybe up through crescent neb yes

[vapid patio]

ok yeah sick

I plan to snag a big ol mosaic im gonna work on this summer

[vapid patio]

I swear I've seen the exact chart 😔

you should do this this winter @harsh matrix

[harsh matrix]

im going to put my 2600 on my roki and run to the bortle 3 site and do that

[vapid patio]

gonna be

b3 backyard

[harsh matrix]

yup

id do it on the redcat with the 2600 but the framing is too tight

[vapid patio]

roki is just as good tbh

i think

[harsh matrix]

it's not

[vapid patio]

yeah i actually thought abt it for a sec

[harsh matrix]

but it's better than every other option in that focal length range

[vapid patio]

fma180?

like a sextuplet or somthing crazy

https://agenaastro.com/askar-fma180-pro-40mm-f-4-5-triplet-apo-lens-astrograph.html?srsltid=AfmBOoqlv8dg1DxtCSpHbXkr6JRXf9PVtN8oSmSJIvpQe-eD49AN4YSK

[harsh matrix]

the FMA doesnt have as good of a field as the roki

[vapid patio]

fair but close

and on roki do you need special filters? as its so fast?

[harsh matrix]

not for broadband but for narrowband, probably yeah

i dont think anything ill have right now will work on it in narrowband

i can of course ask people what they use and see what options i have

[vapid patio]

yeah ofc

dont really wanna step it down be such a waste

[harsh matrix]

yeah

[thorny path]

Declination keeps pushing in one direction. It isn’t bad from what I see being honest but it’s a sign Pa can be improved. In the perfect world, with perfect seeing and perfect PA your dec should even move at all or little

[vapid patio]

Yes I'm aware but good catch it was a quick setup and tear down after I rebuilt my mount

[tight lodge]

@frosty shard , this is my backlash measurements from last night

[frosty shard]

Is this with a properly balanced Dec axis?

[tight lodge]

eyeball it 😄

[tight lodge]

[vapid patio]

Sharp dang

[oblique sun]

@harsh matrix https://app.astrobin.com/i/znttj7

more oversharpened sct images

[harsh matrix]

Noooooooo 😭

[harsh matrix]

crazy sharp

[harsh matrix]

there's a lot more going on with that than just oversharpening

the oversharpening is blatant either way you cut it though

[oblique sun]

he said he did that stuff to make it look good on a print

https://discord.com/channels/794642864218439681/1383578093989531658

[harsh matrix]

that's fair

but also, i think he should make a not garbage looking version for AB lol

[oblique sun]

yea

[harsh matrix]

I like the amount of effort he puts in though

ive been following him on IG almost since i started the hobby

he puts in a truck load of time into all of his projects

i just cant stand the way he processes

[vapid patio]

What we thinking? HOO or SHO?

Sho would be a pain

[thorny path]

sho

cause that region has a lot of Oiii

wait no hoo

i did sho it was nice but i struggled to get any sii

[vapid patio]

yeah, honestly, there’s not much sii

And if I’m doing a four panel mosaic having to manage three channels is a pain

[tight lodge]

Doing RGB you have 4 to manage

[frosty shard]

So uh. I almost dropped my secondary mirror into my primary

Don't ask me how I managed to screw up that bad

Or well. Unscrew up

But at the end of the night, we completely nailed the collimation. Perfect Airy disk through the eyepiece

[frosty shard]

Imagine using luminance unironically

[tight lodge]

if you don't use "Luminance" You might want to use some Ha as luminance

[frosty shard]

I remember some discussion about luminance decreasing contrast but I don't remember the details

[harsh matrix]

[frosty shard]

That's the third different mount I've set my RC up on

[harsh matrix]

btw my 571 might be arriving Monday

i dont think fedex delivers on sundays

[harsh matrix]

[frosty shard]

Sometimes they do which put me in hell when I was supposed to get my Wave 150i

[frosty shard]

First one was my friend's CGEM before I had my mount

[harsh matrix]

[harsh matrix]

icky

[frosty shard]

That thing groans like it pulled a tendon and has some of the most ridiculous slewing decisions

I've seen it slew below the horizon as M9 was nearing the meridian

and then take a minute to finally get there

Honestly it's entertaining to watch

[harsh matrix]

[harsh matrix]

fr

the times i went to the bortle 3 place, i had a guy set up near me with one of the Orion Sirius EQG mounts (HEQ5) and it sounded like someone opened a portal to hell every time it slewed

it was the most uncomfortable sounding mount ive heard so far

[frosty shard]

My friend Philip with the CGEM has gone to dark sites with me and it's funny because I sometimes think "wow maybe my mount is a little louder than I remember" and then I hear the CGEM and the Wave 150i is completely inaudible in comparison

At full slew speed it's only slightly louder than the CGEM's tracking motor

And 7.5°/sec of slew speed

Great for marathons

[harsh matrix]

fr

[tight lodge]

@frosty shard this might be a bit too much for the CF tripod

[vapid patio]

Yeahhhh

What’s funny is after retuning mine mine is really quiet

[frosty shard]

I might have to DM you about what you did so I can pass that on to my friend with the CGEM

[vapid patio]

It was very fun rebuilding it

And scary at the same time

[frosty shard]

So I also realized I may have screwed up the mirror spacing in my RC, so I gotta check that out next time

[harsh matrix]

😭

how

[frosty shard]

I think I got some documentation mixed up in my head, and I thought the secondary mirror screws did not need to be tracked precisely for loosening/tightening. So when Skywave told us that the astigmatism required a serious mirror realignment, I inadvertently loosened the secondary mirror to the point that it started flopping around

[harsh matrix]

oh no

[frosty shard]

I managed to get the mirror realigned and tightened again, but I need to check if there's any spherical aberration - I didn't check rigorously

Unfortunately it's cloudy tonight and I cannot test against an artificial star to fix spherical aberration

[harsh matrix]

I think i found the source of my tilt lmfao

There's a rather large piece of electrical tape sandwiched between the OAG and the filter wheel

[vapid patio]

Why

[harsh matrix]

I was using it to block light leaks i thought we're coming from the OAG, but actually it was probably the focuser

Accidentally pinned a corner by accident when I reinstalled the OAG last, didnt know I did that.

Also my blue filter worked its way loose, I'm super lucky i didnt have issues with flats

And i dropped a screw on the AR glass...

There appears to be a scuff but I think its from my finger nail

Im going to clean it and hopefully it comes off, not the first time this has happened.

Yeah it was from my fingernail thank God, it came off immediately with a DSLR sensor cleaning kit

Ez

[harsh matrix]

Guys, the end game has arrived.

The RC is down for the time being as I don't have very many filters I can run on it right now, and especially not in the filter wheel

But we are getting first light with the 571 tonight, come hell or high water

[vapid patio]

@harsh matrix Busy day haha

[vapid patio]

Redcat?

[frosty shard]

Do you need another filter wheel?

[harsh matrix]

Yes

[harsh matrix]

Already got thay covered, but yes

[harsh matrix]

Quattro

[frosty shard]

I assume you have a coma corrector?

(This is the RC thread, so I feel obliged to say: imagine having coma)

[harsh matrix]

Yes ofc

[harsh matrix]

I may swap over to the redcat after all.

The filter wheel is too big and collides with my mount on the quattro

[vapid patio]

Aw man

[vapid patio]

Get a good early start on the summer projects

[harsh matrix]

Okay i really didnt want to, -1 hour of my day, but I swapped it all back to the AM5N for tonight, maybe tomorrow if the weather remains conducive.

[vapid patio]

Oh well atleast you got that working

Probably a better way to ahow how good the camera is anyway

[vapid patio]

I was planning on buying the oiii and sii filter and stupid svbony made the oiii 130 a couple hours ago so now i had to pay almost double

and i bought sii right before it could get raised 😭

[tight lodge]

Why you didn't get it in black?

[harsh matrix]

Wasn't an option from who I bought it from

I tried

[tight lodge]

[harsh matrix]

Yeah

At least the filter wheel doesn't stick out anymore

[frosty shard]

You must get it in blue to be part of the RGB gamer scope collective.

[tight lodge]

Right I forgot. Rainbow month🤣

[tight lodge]

Atleast is not all red. He proves he's not a ZWO simp

[frosty shard]

Also true, 'tis the season.

I wish I could drag y'all over to see this optically perfect Airy disk I've managed to obtain

Matching intrafocal and extrafocal patterns, complete first ring around the center

Thankfully the spherical aberration correction was not ruined and my mirrors are exactly where they need to be

Also, I just realized that I verified that my primary mirror is perfectly secure with respect to altitude

[oblique sun]

Are the orion rcs good

[harsh matrix]

Yeah

Same as the rest

[vapid patio]

@tight lodge svbony sucks

The oiii filter shot up to 130 everywhere

So i bought it on ebay for 130 with some coupons

Then today its back down to a shocking 77 dollars

Now i gotta return it

[frosty shard]

They come with an extra finderscope shoe, which I personally would find very convenient