Guiding problems after update

Sequence Generator
#1

I’ve Been using SGP for around 6 months now and absolutely love it and up until now it’s worked pretty much straight out of the box. However, a few days ago a fellow user suggested that I upgrade to SGP 2.4.0 which I did. Last night I carried on with a sequence, M81 & M82, that I was half way through (I’d Collected the Lum and Red a few nights previous) and started and completed the green without any problems (20 x 5 min subs) I paused the sequence as I prefer to carry out a manual auto focus rather than letting the focus be completely automated by SGP. The Blue filter was selected and the Focus graph gave me the green X. So far so good.

This is where the problem started. When I clicked on resume sequence, an error message popped up saying I need to upgrade PHD2 to 2.4.1 or newer (bearing in mind I had already completed the green sequence without upgrading or any any guiding issues). To cut along story short I couldn’t find 2.4.1 but I did download PHD2 2.5.0. The error message disappeared and I resumed the sequence, however guiding was way off. Before this I’ve been guiding without an issue and taking 20 min HA subs with 1/2 pixel corrections.
The RA was only tracking close to the 0 line for a few mins before heading off into the sunset. I would click stop and loop and PHD again and the RA and Dec would come straight back to the line and again with a few mins the RA would track off. I changed the correction rate from 2.5 secs, down to 1 second, but this didn’t change the RA wondering off. It was almost as if I hadn’t locked onto the guide star. In case it helps, the time this started was 11.30pm and I finally gave up at 1am.

I appreciate, this isn’t the PHD forum, but as SGP prompted me to upgrade I thought I would post here 1st, just in case I need to adjust some settings in SGP.

My equipment is as follows.

Avalon linear
Tak 85
OAG with lodestar
Atik 490EX

Best wishes

Darren

#2

Darren,
If I haven’t said it before welcome to SGP!
You’ve got a lot going on there, and we’re going to need to see your log file.
Please see the post below.
For now, I would suggest making sure your programs are up to date (SGP 2.4.1.3 Beta and latest PHD snapshot build http://openphdguiding.org/snapshots.html)
How to ask for help

#3

At the moment the latest PHD2 release is 2.5.0. http://openphdguiding.org/

Darren, in addition to posting your SGP log as Joel suggested, you should also post your phd2 logs for the session.

Andy

#4

Sorry Gents,

I’ve found the SGP Log files, but how do I post them. Copy and paste? or do they go into a file?

Darren

#5

Upload the file to your favorite server. Most popular server is dropbox.com and it’s cool and free.

Peter

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#6

Thanks Peter,

I’ve created a drop box folder, but what address do I send / share it to?

Darren

#7

Darren,

Post the link here on this forum in a reply to this post. Please include your PHD2 logs as well.

Andy

#8

Place the log files in your dropbox folder, then right click on the file and choose “share file link”. Then just paste the link into a forum message here.

#9

Thanks Gents,

I hope that’s correct.

#10

Darren, sorry, one more thing… could you please upload the phd2 debug logs as well?
Thanks,
Andy

#11

They’re in Drop Box Andy and thanks very much for the help.

Darren

#12

Darren,

From the PHD2 debug log it looks like at around 00:09 the Scope ASCOM driver started failing to respond to pulse guide commands.

00:09:29.236 00.000 3332 invoke: [800706ba] The RPC server is unavailable. 00:09:29.236 00.000 3332 ScopeASCOM::IsSlewing failed: A COM Error occurred. There may be more info in the Debug Log. 00:09:29.236 00.000 3332 invoke: [800706ba] The RPC server is unavailable. 00:09:29.236 00.000 3332 Error thrown from scope_ascom.cpp:685->ASCOM Scope: IsGuiding - IsPulseGuiding failed: A COM Error occurred. There may be more info in the Debug Log. 00:09:29.236 00.000 3332 IsGuiding returns 0 00:09:29.237 00.001 3332 pulseguide: [800706ba] The RPC server is unavailable. 00:09:29.237 00.000 3332 dispid(CanPulseGuide): [800706ba] The RPC server is unavailable. 00:09:29.237 00.000 3332 Error thrown from scope_ascom.cpp:586->ASCOM Scope: pulseguide command failed: A COM Error occurred. There may be more info in the Debug Log. 00:09:29.237 00.000 3332 Error thrown from scope.cpp:626->guide failed

Also, in the SGP log we see the following error from the EQMOD ASCOM driver:

[15/04/2015 00:10:34] [DEBUG] [Telescope Thread] Auto Center scope frame solved successfully... [15/04/2015 00:10:34] [DEBUG] [Telescope Thread] Telescope: Syncing to RA: 9.86314705624966 Dec: 69.8367439774065 [15/04/2015 00:10:34] [DEBUG] [Telescope Thread] ASCOM Telescope: Error in Park : SyncToCoordinates() RaDec slew is not allowed while scope is not Tracking. (System.Reflection.TargetInvocationException: Exception has been thrown by the target of an invocation. ---> System.Runtime.InteropServices.COMException: SyncToCoordinates() RaDec slew is not allowed while scope is not Tracking. --- End of inner exception stack trace --- at System.RuntimeType.InvokeDispMethod(String name, BindingFlags invokeAttr, Object target, Object[] args, Boolean[] byrefModifiers, Int32 culture, String[] namedParameters) at System.RuntimeType.InvokeMember(String name, BindingFlags bindingFlags, Binder binder, Object target, Object[] providedArgs, ParameterModifier[] modifiers, CultureInfo culture, String[] namedParams) at System.Type.InvokeMember(String name, BindingFlags invokeAttr, Binder binder, Object target, Object[] args, CultureInfo culture) at ASCOM.DriverAccess.MemberFactory.CallMember(Int32 memberCode, String memberName, Type[] parameterTypes, Object[] parms) in c:\ASCOM Build\Export\ASCOM.DriverAccess\MemberFactory.cs:line 443) at ASCOM.DriverAccess.MemberFactory.CallMember(Int32 memberCode, String memberName, Type[] parameterTypes, Object[] parms) in c:\ASCOM Build\Export\ASCOM.DriverAccess\MemberFactory.cs:line 483 at ASCOM.DriverAccess.Telescope.SyncToCoordinates(Double RightAscension, Double Declination) in c:\ASCOM Build\Export\ASCOM.DriverAccess\Telescope.cs:line 1129 at ah.Sync(Double ra, Double dec)

So I think something weird happened with EQMOD at around 00:09. Did it terminate for some reason?

The next step would be to look at the EQMOD log files. I do not use EQMOD so I probably won’t be able to help too much with that part.

Andy

#13

Thanks Andy,

Can you determine what ASCOM driver may need updating or re-installing?

Darren

#14

Sorry I should have said is it just the EQMOD driver that requires attention?

Darren

#15

The SGP and PHD2 logs do not tell us what eqmod version you have, you’d need to find the EQMOD logs. Not being an EQMOD user, I can’t say where you would need to look. Maybe some other EQMOD users could help?

Andy

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