Can you add ability to park at non-normal park position?

biptunia

...while retaining Polar Align, then when starting a session, re-park to normal scope-up position before starting?

Can you add it as a feature? For people with roll-off-roof observatories who can't close the roof with a large scope on mount pointed at Polaris? Basically have two park positions. One pointing at your Celestial Pole, and another sideways so roof will close.

I asked on ASIAIR facebook group if this was possible, an Admin deleted the post and told me it was not possible.

Can you make it possible please?

Thank you.

w7ay

biptunia

ASIAIR is severely crippled in that it does not understand the horizon coordinate system, or even be able to GOTO a specific hour angle of the mount. This makes it impossible to directly GOTO a fixed point relative to your local horizon.

However, you can bring up an LST (Local Sidereal Time) clock (lots of apps on Apple and Android app stores), and just use the equatorial coordinate system. The LST is simply the RA of the Prime Meridian.

For example, set the RA to the LST minus 6 hours, and declination to +0º, and your OTA should point at the western horizon to clear the roof when you GOTO that coordinate.

Set the RA to LST plus 6 hours, with at declination +0º, and your OTA should point to the eastern horizon.

Chen

Tech@ZWO

biptunia We are planning to add park feature on AM5/AM3, and will consider the park feature on other mounts in the future.

w7ay

Tech@ZWO We are planning to add park feature on AM5/AM3, and will consider the park feature on other mounts in the future.

Why not just allow a user to use the Alt-Az (horizon) coordinate system when issuing a GOTO (in addition to the current equatorial system).

That way, all a user has to do is to add a target that uses the horizon system in his/her "My Favourites" list and be able to specify any custom location for parking (or polar alignment).

Chen

Dsqh3WbQ

Tech@ZWO I am curious if this "custom park position" feature has been added, or is still going to be added for other mounts (non-ZWO mounts) when using the ASIAir Plus? I am heavily contemplating constructing an observatory and would need the ability to have a custom park position. Right now I believe I would need to discard the ASIAir Plus and switch to NINA to be able to do so. I would much rather stick to what I know, the ASIAir Plus.

If we could slew the mount to a given position by way of the manual slew controls, with tracking disabled, and a button marked "set custom park" under the mount menu to set the position as the custom park position would be much appreciated. Of course also add a "GoTo custom park" button under the mount menu as well. Additionally, if the "custom park" (after being set as stated above) could be added to the sequence in plan or auto run mode as opposed to "go home" would be exceptional.

I would not want a "custom park" setting to completely replace the go home feature of the ASIAir Plus. Obviously a go home command is still a very useful feature for many reasons.

Having a custom park feature on the ASIAir Plus could remove a reason someone may choose not to purchase an ASIAir Plus. Obviously this pertains to someone looking to install an observatory and may not already be using NINA or an ASIAir.

Tech@ZWO

w7ay Thanks for your suggestions, passed to our ASIAIR team,

biptunia

Tech@ZWO Thank you!

In the meantime what I've discovered is I can get pretty close just by leaving the mount tripod where it is, removing the clutch and just turn the mount sideways to shut the roof. I manually put it back after I open up, and I still check PA, but 9 times out of 10 it's with margin of error. I just hit "synch to mount" and "go to home" before starting PA.

gizmo_s67

I sure would like to have zenith for a park position to take flat frames in the field.

tomzo

After using SGP and NINA for years I am now using ASIAIR and the lack of this feature is a significant disappointment. I have a flat panel on the wall of my ROR observatory and used to be able to park the scope pointing at the flat panel and then get my flats done. While it is not a deal killer, it does seem to be an oversight in the software. Since the ASIAIR will remain on when parked, it can just go to a position and stop tracking. I would think it could "remember" where home position was and where it "is" while tracking is off.

Tech@ZWO

The custom parking position spot feature is not currently available. I will log this issue with our development team. Thank you for your suggestion.