BYN - Dither without guiding

[fkleinha]

I know how to dither using PHD2.  Now I want to dither without guiding.  Nothing seems to work.

BYN 2.1.3 Premium and Nikon D850. RST-135E mount under ASCOM control. And mount pointing by STP3.

I understand:  Under BYN Settings > Dither > I have Provider Ascom, Dither on Start up - Check, Dither aggressiveness 5, Calm Down 15 sec, Dither every 1 frame. And click dither on the main screen.

Two initial points:  The sequencer is not waiting 15 secs between subs, so I don't think dithering is active.  As to whether I can see a dither, I just have a 135 mm fl lens shooting my work room ceiling.   I can see the motion of the subs across the ceiling during repeated 5 sec pics (pause time) due to tracking. I do not see any additional motion due to dithering.  This begs the question - What do the aggressiveness numbers (1-5) mean?

My RST-135E has a stated tracking accuracy of +/- 2.5 arc/sec which should allow pics to at least 300 mm fl without guiding.  Thus my need for Dither no Guide. 

Thanks for any help.  Indy Fritz

 

 

[astroman133]

Is the mount in GEM mode? Does the ASCOM driver for the RST-135E mount support pulse guiding? Which axes are supported?

The log file may be revealing if an error is being logged.

If you have Dither On Startup selected on the settings screen and then click on the Dither button you may be turning dithering off.

Dithering is on -->

Dithering is off -->

The button background is darker when dithering is off. Also the button icon is a straight line rather than a waveform when dithering is off.

I hope this helps.

[fkleinha]

5 hours ago, astroman133 said:

Is the mount in GEM mode? Does the ASCOM driver for the RST-135E mount support pulse guiding? Which axes are supported?

The log file may be revealing if an error is being logged.

If you have Dither On Startup selected on the settings screen and then click on the Dither button you may be turning dithering off.

Dithering is on -->

Dithering is off -->

The button background is darker when dithering is off. Also the button icon is a straight line rather than a waveform when dithering is off.

I hope this helps.

Thanks for taking a stab at my problem.  A big part of my problem may be that I am trying to do two things at once.  1) get Dithering NO Guiding working and 2) Set up a new laptop.  There may be some connection issues and I am losing my Ascom connection before starting to dither.

In answer to your questions:  The mount is in GEM mode.   When I dither with PHD2, all signals go thru the USB connection to the mount and none thru the guide port (ST4 port).  I think this is called pulse guiding.   I am using the same cable configuration for 'dithering no guiding'.  I understand what you are saying about the dithering on/off button.  That is not the problem.

At the moment I am dead in the water.  My laptop has lost its 'Com and Prt' ports and I can no longer connect up.  This I expect I will have to beat to death myself

[astroman133]

Good luck solving your COM port issue. Let us know how it goes.

[fkleinha]

2 hours ago, astroman133 said:

Good luck solving your COM port issue. Let us know how it goes.

Thanks for checking in Rick (and anyone else out there).  I made the com port problem go away (temporarily!) by switching to WiFi.  So, now back to Dithering No Guiding.  My only data point after some brief work on this -  The Calm Down Period under dithering has no effect.    The only pause between subs is controlled by the  Pause setting in the main settings list.  This makes me think that dithering is probably not working.  But I will have to get out under the sky to be sure.  And I would still like to know what the Aggressiveness settings mean when PHD2 is not running.  I am about ready to abandon this for lack of documentation and go to NINA or APT

[astroman133]

There is a post by the author of BYE/BYN in the How-to's Forum that is entitled "Debunking Dithering!". It is 10 years old and was posted before direct ASCOM dithering was added to BYN.

When I was actively imaging I was also autoguiding with PHD2, so never used the ASCOM dithering capability in BYE or BYN and do not know if all the dithering settings in are used in the same way as when PHD2 is used. If I remember correctly, some of the settings are sent to PHD2 to be used there so it is possible that not all of them are used by ASCOM dithering.

I would suggest looking through the archives of the forums on this web site to see if any old posts provide answers. Another thought is to look at log file that was created during a session where you tried to use ASCOM Dithering. There may also be a log file where the ASCOM mount driver logs commands that it receives. This may give you a better idea what is actually going on.

[admin]

When I implemented ASCOM dithering, I did it with 10 Micron mounts, and it worked pretty well. When you connect your mount to BYE, via the ASCOM control, does it move when you press the control buttons?

[astroman133]

Guylain,

Does ASCOM dithering require a Premium or Trial license and must the user connect BYN to the mount via ASCOM before they can do ASCOM dithering?

Thanks!

[admin]

Everything ASCOM requires Premium (or Trial) to work. Yes, Mount must be connected to BYE via the ASCOM control.

[fkleinha]

12 hours ago, admin said:

When I implemented ASCOM dithering, I did it with 10 Micron mounts, and it worked pretty well. When you connect your mount to BYE, via the ASCOM control, does it move when you press the control buttons?

Yes, the mount does move with the Ascom control buttons.  I am using BYN, not BYE.   Difference?

19 hours ago, astroman133 said:

There is a post by the author of BYE/BYN in the How-to's Forum that is entitled "Debunking Dithering!". It is 10 years old and was posted before direct ASCOM dithering was added to BYN.

When I was actively imaging I was also autoguiding with PHD2, so never used the ASCOM dithering capability in BYE or BYN and do not know if all the dithering settings in are used in the same way as when PHD2 is used. If I remember correctly, some of the settings are sent to PHD2 to be used there so it is possible that not all of them are used by ASCOM dithering.

I would suggest looking through the archives of the forums on this web site to see if any old posts provide answers. Another thought is to look at log file that was created during a session where you tried to use ASCOM Dithering. There may also be a log file where the ASCOM mount driver logs commands that it receives. This may give you a better idea what is actually going on.

I've already searched this forum.  No luck.   Good idea to look at the log files.  I do dithering with PHD2, no problem.  The aggressiveness setting in BYN is a multiplier of settings in PHD2.  It is totally opaque what this setting does when Dithering No Guiding.  Documentation problem.

PS:  I do have the Premium or what ever best version.  Saturday nite hope to be under the stars.  Maybe I'll learn something then.

[fkleinha]

7 hours ago, admin said:

Everything ASCOM requires Premium (or Trial) to work. Yes, Mount must be connected to BYE via the ASCOM control.

Yes, I am using ASCOM (with STP3) and BYN.  Can you give me any clue what the 1-5 Aggressiveness settings mean when doing Dithering No Guiding (ie. no PHD2)?  Thanks

[astroman133]

The dithering functionality is the same between BYE and BYN. Since the BYE forum is much more active than BYN, you should also look there for answers.

If the dithering in PHD2 uses the "on-camera" setting then it uses the ST-4 cable between the camera and the mount for guiding. This is significantly different from using ASCOM dithering because it does not exercise the telescope driver's Pulse Guide implementation. You should do a test of dithering by configuring PHD2 to use your mount rather than the on-camera setting.

Do the log files for both BYN and your telescope driver show evidence of dithering taking place?

[fkleinha]

7 hours ago, astroman133 said:

The dithering functionality is the same between BYE and BYN. Since the BYE forum is much more active than BYN, you should also look there for answers.

If the dithering in PHD2 uses the "on-camera" setting then it uses the ST-4 cable between the camera and the mount for guiding. This is significantly different from using ASCOM dithering because it does not exercise the telescope driver's Pulse Guide implementation. You should do a test of dithering by configuring PHD2 to use your mount rather than the on-camera setting.

Do the log files for both BYN and your telescope driver show evidence of dithering taking place?

I'll be under the stars Saturday nite. Hope that will yield new data.  I never use ST-4 guiding.  I've always done guiding via Ascom and PHD2.  I am experienced with dithering with guiding.  My entire issue is with dithering with out guiding.  Saturday will be the test.  The log files are the one thing I have not explored.  Sat nite!

[astroman133]

BYN logging is always on. Driver logging must be turned on and then stays on until turned off. So you may already have the BYN log files that show whether or not Dithering commands were sent to the mount.

I am unsure why you would need to be "under the stars" to test the ASCOM dithering functionality of BYN, since it does not need to calculate the movement of a guide star between two guide camera images.