Moving an AM5N below its horizon with Sharpcap?

[mfratto]

I am using Sharpcap with an AM5N and trying to automate my runs. At the end of the run, I want to point my OTA towards the ground to keep dew off and birds out.

There doesn't seem to be a way to set a custom park in the AM5N and when I have Sharpcap tell it to move to az 270 and Alt -90, the AM5N ASCOM app says it can't because its below the horizon. No kidding. The Altitude Limit in ZWO's Windows ASCOM driver is NOT enabled.

Anyway I can get around this?

[admin]

Hi,

it depends on how dirty you want to play... In theory you could send a sync command to the mount that is deliberately off, so maybe you tell it that it is pointing at RA=20, but actually it's pointing at RA=14. If the mount accepts the sync then it's going to be thinking that it is pointing at 90 degrees from its real position. You could then 'GOTO' something on the horizon and it would end up pointing at the ground (or the zenith - depending on which horizon).

Of course there are issues with this - firstly calculating the required co-ordinates for the fake sync and the GOTO is hard. Secondly you need to undo the fake sync back to real co-ordinates before using the mount next time and thirdly because you will be forcing the mount to move below the horizon, you could end up with the telescope/camera colliding with the pier/tripod - normally the horizon limit should prevent this.

I think that overall, that approach is more theoretical than practical, sorry...

cheers,

Robin

[mfratto]

Thanks. It's an interesting approach.

I bought this mount to make my life easier but other than being significantly lighter than my CGEM, it really hasn't. I suspect that all of the rave reviews of the AM5N are from people that are using it with an ASI Air.

I mean, even Celestron lets you define a custom park.

[admin]

Just a thought, has anyone written a custom ASCOM driver for the mount (like EQMOD or Green Swamp Server for Skywatcher mounts)? Often those end-user written drivers tend to have bettter support and more features than the manufacturer driver...

cheers,

Robin

[mfratto]

I don't know. I can go look. If I find anything out, I'll update here.