Alnitak Flip Flat intermittently activates during sequence

During a test sequence, I noticed the Flip Flat light does not come on if I set sequence to take lights then flats. However, if the sequence is lights then darks then flats, the light comes on. My guess is while the Flip Flat is closing it somehow doesn’t get the command to turn the light on and therefore the sequence keeps running but without the light on. However after taking darks the Flip Flat is already closed so the command to turn the light on is received. Not sure if SGP gets feedback from the Flip Flat driver but it does have status messages for when it is open/closed/light on/etc. Perhaps a delay between commands is needed? This is just a theory but wanted to share this and see if there is anything that can be done to resolve it. If you need a log file I’ll have to retrieve it.

Thanks.

Ciao,
Mel

Always helpful… they can save a lot of time tracking issues.

sg_logfile_20170327204447.zip (95.4 KB)
I’ve attached the logs and equipment profile used. I noticed in the log with the light issue there is no “Turning Light On” command issued whereas in the log where the sequence works there is a “Turning Light On” command issued for each Flat. Hope this helps.

So it looks like the brightness is being set…just that it’s 0:

[03/27/17 21:32:00.048][DEBUG] [Main Thread] Alnitak Flat Box - Setting Brightness to 0

Did you happen to setup the brightness values in the filter setup? It’s a little buried:

Thanks,
Jared

All of my filters have names (luminance, red, green, blue, clear) and flats options are set to the appropriate values (exposure, brightness level, number of flats, etc). Not sure why they show nothing in your image. Those settings aren’t what I get when the equipment is connected. Also I don’t make any changes to the filter section during each test run. Like I mentioned before, it doesn’t work if the sequence order is light-flats-darks and it does work if the sequence order is lights-darks-flats. There is a section in one of the logs where it shows there is no “turn light on” command issued during the flats image captures when the sequence is preceded by lights and in the other log there is a “turn light on” command issued when preceded by darks. Can you verify that is the case?

I’ll look at the equipment profile again just to be sure but I’m pretty sure it’s set up the way it is supposed to be. I agree the filter flats info is buried pretty deep! If you need me to, I can do another run with each scenario and send those log files.

Thanks.

I have upgraded to v4 and this still seems to be an issue. When closing flat panel, light does not turn on afterwards. Also, it would be nice to have the option to bypass the auto open/close behavior of the panel before camera exposure. In particular, frame and focus is the only way to put the camera in continuous loop and testing exposure values while flat panel is closed and lighted. Closing flat panel during exposure causes the other issue already reported about potential exposure status lockup.