Connecting ASIAIR Pro to Celestron Evolution Mount: Page 5

Connecting ASIAIR Pro to Celestron Evolution Mount

StarBrowser

Ok. So I got the card programmed and the AAP has come up. However soon as I bring the Aire App up it wants to update to latest OS and doesn't appear to have an option to bypass the update.

Good to hear this will all get integrated into the future versions.

mj972

StarBrowser thats fine - the driver is part of the OS, and it’ll remain after the update

StarBrowser

Ok, thanks. Wanted to make sure it wouldn't undo the fix as my understanding was that the App updated the firmware when you did OS updates.

w7ay

StarBrowser Chen, which tool do you use for making archived sounds like APB may not be best, two, mj, which option do you use for the RPi Imager?

If APB means ApplePie Baker, that is the one I use. 64 Bit V1 version, although I think they have fixed most of the V2 bugs.

I don't let ApplePie Baker default to compression. I religiously choose uncompressed to archive a disk image. ApplePie Baker has not failed for me ever since using Raspberry Pi (raw, StellarMate,INDIGO Sky, etc). Many people have all sorts of problems (producing an unrestorable image, etc), likely caused by letting AppePie Baker compress.

An uncompress image size is 32 GB. After compressing, it is about 11 GB. The difference is miniscue since I have six 2 TB SSD connected to my Mac Mini. I have pretty much every microSD card image of ASIAIR going back to v1.2, plus some of the intermediate firmware for their Betas too.

(Retired from Apple in 2005 after 17 years there, and I still don't trust third party Mac programs :-)

Chen

StarBrowser

It is working! From what I can tell all looks good. I have manual control and targeting control. Won't know how well the plate solving works with my setup until it is night time (the AAP tried but it is daytime.

Thanks everyone for all the hand holding and getting me up and going.

w7ay

StarBrowser Won't know how well the plate solving works with my setup until it is night time

Plate Solve is independent of your mount; it is simply using the camera to take an image, and then using asterisms to figure out where the center of the plate is.

"Sync And GoTo" (after the plate solve) does however interact with your mount. But with GOTO working, that should also work, unless the Sync function is broken.

The acid test is going to be that 60º Polar alignment slew that so many Celestron users seem to have a problem with.

Once you are past that, it should just be routine use of the ASIAIR.

Chen

StarBrowser

Chen, will the AAP still issue the 60deg polar alignment after the first plate solve even for an alt-az mount like the unhedged 6SE? Not sure why it would, but it may not know not to do that. I guess I will be finding out when I get a chance to get out under the stars. Thanks as always.

w7ay

StarBrowser will the AAP still issue the 60deg polar alignment after the first plate solve even for an alt-az mount like the unhedged 6SE?

No, I don't know what ASIAIR would do with an Alt-Az mount.

The whole exercise with polar alignment is to get one of the motor axes (the RA axis) to be perfectly parallel with the rotational axis (the axis that passes though the north and south celestial poles)of the earth. If this is not done, you will get field rotation through the night -- autoguiding will just make sure the guide star (or in the case of multi-star guiding, the weighted average centroid of all the guide stars) remains still in the view of the guide scope. If not polar aligned, all the other stars will rotate slowly (or quickly depending on how sloppy the alignment is :-) around this guided centroid.

This is why you need to polar align even if you autoguide. (Or use a field rotator, but ASIAIR does not support guiding with a field rotator).

An alt-az will have this field rotation, obviously -- lots of it, since neither axis is parallel to the earth's axis unless you are Santa Claus or a penguin that lives at the Amundsen station, in which case the azimuth axis becomes your RA axis.

Thus short exposures needed if you use alt-az mounts. (Again unless you use a field rotator like the Optec Pyxis, and an autoguiding program than knows who to control it.)

Chen

StarBrowser

Now that the AAP and 6SE are communicating. I wondered if tracking and the AAP GoTo function are working for anyone else with an SE mount in alt-az mode? Should the AAP tracking be turned on or will the SE (which has been aligned) keep trying to do that and create a conflict. Anyone at ZWO who can say whether, the AAP with work with alt-az mounts with respect to tracking, etc? I know there are multiple alt-az mounts on the AAP telescope mount list. Thanks for any info.

mj972

I think you're in the best position to try and find out :-)
Since the communication protocol is the same,my guess is it'll work, but nothing gives an answer like real world experimentation...

StarBrowser

That is true but didn’t have success the first night so thought I would ask if there was a basic problem. I have more experiments to try. So with your Evolution mount does AAP tracking and AAP GoTo work? And are you using as Alt-az or EQ?

w7ay

StarBrowser

Remember too that tracking is turned on automatically by most German mounts after the mount finishes executing a GOTO command from the computer, even if it were off before the GOTO was given.

Chen

mj972

I think tracking is a feature of the mount, not the AAP. Once the mount is aligned, you can set its tracking rate (solar, lunar, sidereal) either via the hand controller or via the AAP’s interface. Regardless of the way you set it, tracking is done by the mount, and so it is (as I understand it) irrelevant whether the mount is EQ or Alt/Az. Up to now, I’ve used the AAP three times since I was able to connect it to my mount, twice with a wedge, and once without. In all three times I was able to use the GoTo function and tracking. Of course, the accuracy of both is a question of alignment, and I did find the EQ configuration to be more accurate.

I’m supposed to receive my ASI120 in a few days, and then I’ll be able to use it to do some planetary work, probably using Alt/AZ mode. I’ll let you know of the results 😃

StarBrowser

Ok, I guess I was a bit confused (too many late nights as of late 😀) by the "tracking" on/off switch on the Telescope Settings panel in the app. I knew the SE tracks after a GoTo action, but it wasn't clear what the app switch was suppose to do. Did the APP provide some sort of tracking input to the scope? Right now I realize that is not really possible given it doesn't have the knowledge to do so (especially given there isn't a guide scope!) I was seeing some tracking/alignment issues but need to investigate further. Thanks.

w7ay

StarBrowser it wasn't clear what the app switch was suppose to do.

There are many uses for that switch.

When you are doing a manual Meridian Flip, you can pause tracking as the object gets close to the Meridian. Then wait for the object to transit the Meridian, and then issue a GOTO to the same object (a German mount will then execute a Meridian Flip.

Depending on the design, an alt-az mount, for example a fork mount, may not need to do a Meridian flip, but there are uses of that switch. For example if you want to focus in the daytime on a far away tower or tree. You don't want tracking to be on.

Did the APP provide some sort of tracking input to the scope?

If APP means the ASIAIR, then no, the ASIAIR does not do any computation related to tracking. The mount does all that complex stuff. The ASIAIR merely asks the mount to track at the appropriate rate (Sidereal, Solar, Lunar or King rate).

especially given there isn't a guide scope

Guide scope has nothing to do with tracking. Autoguiding is a process of using a guide star (or multiple guide stars) to correct for any tracking errors that are caused by imprecise tracking speed, gears that are imperfect, mount not polar aligned, etc).

Chen

StarBrowser

Thanks Chen for examples possible uses of the tracking switch. I probably should have worded my comment about the guide scope differentlly. My intended point was that the AAP (APP was a typo) would have no way of impacting tracking if it didn't have some form of input about what the main scope was doing. I picked a guide scope as a theoretical source of input - that just confused things instead. I do understand the guide scope is just there to enable corrections to tracking errors.

I do have a question about the plate solving. In my test a couple nights ago I found that while the AAP detected 91 stars it was unable to reach a solution when executing plate solve. I should have a solid 1+deg FOV - 6SE with 6.3 reducer and ASI183MC camera. From what I have read I expect that should be enough to achieve a solution (given good focus and good tracking). Is that correct?

w7ay

StarBrowser From what I have read I expect that should be enough to achieve a solution (given good focus and good tracking). Is that correct?

In addition to plate scale, other reasons why plate solving can fail are things like geometric distortion, field flateness, etc, although I don't expect that to be a problem with a camera that has such a small FOV as the ASI183.

But you need to first focus the image to be tack sharp. Bloated stars may not be recognized as stars.

Those 91 stars could also have a large percentage of hot pixels, and that will introduce false asterisms to confuse the pattern matcher. Even if it says 91 stars, try upping the exposure time; not to achieve more stars, but to get more stars with good signal to noise ratio. Poor focusing will also reduce the signal to noise ratio.

Finally, please be aware that ASIAIR does not plate solve anything within 20º of the two poles very well -- were you plate solving near the pole?

Chen

StarBrowser

I was closer to 30-40deg away from pole if I remember correctly. I will make sure to take that into consideration in my next attempts. I will also try using the exposure time and making sure I get a good SN ratio. Thanks for the hints.

Tonal

Hi mj972, do you know if that new firmware works on ASIAIR first edition (no PRO)?
I downloaded the file and it is named ASIAIR-Pro-OS, but I have the old one.
Tks

w7ay

Tonal it is named ASIAIR-Pro-OS

Go here

https://astronomy-imaging-camera.com/manuals/How_to_Restore_ASIAIR_OS.pdf

There are two links in Step 2, one for "ASIAIR" and the other for "ASIAIR PRO" (a misnomer since no prosumer would touch this stuff).

The first is the image for the Raspberry Pi 3 version of the ASIAIR, and the second is the image for the Raspberry Pi 4 version of the ASIAIR.

Chen

Tonal

w7ay
Hi Chen, is that firmware modified to work with the new Prolific USB chip used by Celestron and Skywatcher hand controller?
As many other guys I cannot connect ASIAIR to my CGX. I find in the forum a solution, installing a new upgraded firmware (https://bbs.astronomy-imaging-camera.com/d/12655-how-to-connect-the-new-sky-watcher-eq6-r-pro-to-asiair), but I have the first ASIAIR version, not the PRO.
Does it work?

« Previous Page Next Page »