Planetary with ALT/AZ Evolution mount control

[admin]

Hi,

I think there are a number of issues that combine to make things hard with these mounts, including quite a lot of backlash in the mount movements and (potentially) a software backlash compensation in action in the mount hand controller. Finally, if the mount stops tracking while moving for calibration, that can cause more issues.

I am putting out an update later today that will have an option for continuous (rather than the current pulsed) movement for calibration - I think that might help with difficult mounts like this one. The other thing is to choose the right movement speed - if you watch the 'Scatter' graph during calibration and you see that the two calibration lines from +Dec and -Dec are not opposite each other (instead forming a wide 'V' shape), you can try either using a higher movement speed (which should make the V wider and therefore closer to opposite) or using the 'guiding rate' option if available which *might* make the two lines opposite (depending on how/if your mount handles pulse guiding movements...)

cheers,

Robin

[ppontoriero]

Robin, what mount works best with feature tracking for solar? I am thinking of buying another mount for my Lunt 60MT. Just can't get my celestron alt az to work properly and making constant adjustments during a capture session is getting annoying. Thanks!

[admin]

Hi,

it's difficult to recommend from my own experience, since the mount I use is a belt modified Skywatcher NEQ6 - i.e. not an off the shelf piece of equipment.

Things that seem to help are

* Minimal backlash (ie belts, not gears)
* Good choice of movement speeds from within SharpCap (ie via ASCOM driver)
* Option of wired connection if you experience glitches/dropout with any wireless connection

cheers,

Robin

[Beyondlumen]

Hi,

I think there are a number of issues that combine to make things hard with these mounts, including quite a lot of backlash in the mount movements and (potentially) a software backlash compensation in action in the mount hand controller. Finally, if the mount stops tracking while moving for calibration, that can cause more issues.

I am putting out an update later today that will have an option for continuous (rather than the current pulsed) movement for calibration - I think that might help with difficult mounts like this one. The other thing is to choose the right movement speed - if you watch the 'Scatter' graph during calibration and you see that the two calibration lines from +Dec and -Dec are not opposite each other (instead forming a wide 'V' shape), you can try either using a higher movement speed (which should make the V wider and therefore closer to opposite) or using the 'guiding rate' option if available which *might* make the two lines opposite (depending on how/if your mount handles pulse guiding movements...)

cheers,

Robin

Has this update been released?

[admin]

Hi,

yes, absolutely, there are now options for continuous and stepped movements in the feature tracking calibration setup.

cheers,

Robin

[Beyondlumen]

First and foremost thank you, I'll have to check out this feature