Well this is a strange problem. If I try to “slew here” or “center here” by right clicking on for example the center of a galaxy in an image, it moves the scope in the wrong direction. So if the galaxy is to the right of the crosshairs and I click on it and tell it to “center here” it goes through the usual centering routine, but it moves the target farther away from the center, not closer. Even stranger, the centering routine thinks it’s doing a great job, and gives me a “success” message and tells me it within 10 pixels when it obviously is not. I don’t know what has changed as I have been using this centering for years with no issue. Any help appreciated. Dark sky and no wind is being wasted tonight.
Dean
SGPro 4.3, for some targets and some rigs, can produce backwards (flipped) solve results. You didn’t mention what versions or solvers you were using, but these problems exist in both Plate Solve 2 and ASTAP. SGPro 4.4 has these issues fixed (as far as we can tell) and it is pretty close to release. You can download and use it now if you want by downloading it from the Beta section.
Hi Ken,
Sorry for the missing details. I am using Win 11 and SGP 4.3.0.1131. I am using ASTAP and Plate Solve2. Catelogues are D50 and APM.
I have made some progress by redownloading the catalogues, and plate solving and “center here” works great…east of the meridian. I am imaging M51, and last night when I tried to do a meridian flip when it was almost directly overhead, I got a popup message telling me it couldn’t slew to the target because the target was 8 degrees below the horizon. Of course this was off by around 90 degrees, and M51 was almost at the zenith.
I will attach the error message. Thanks for any help! And I will try the beta version of SGP tonight.
Dean
Okay an update. SGP 4.4.0.1333 beta and Windows 11. I have reinstalled ASTAP and PlateSolve2 and the D50 and APM catalogues. I can solve and sync the telescope with either PlateSolve2 or ASTAP no problem. I can right click on an image using either solver and they solve it in seconds. I then tell it to transfer the coordinates to the current target, and check that it has done so. Then I tell it to either slew or center on the target (that it is already on) and I get the above error message again. It will not go to the target whether east or west of the meridian. It usually seems to be out about 90 degrees, telling me the target is just below the horizon when it is actually at the zenith. Any help appreciated. This is my last night to be set up for months, as I will be leaving the Valley of the Gods in Utah for home in Canada in the morning.
It’s hard to tell what is happening. Are you able to send logs of the session you’re describing here? Guidance here:
Also… what would be even more helpful than logs would be the actual image you are clicking on in order to direct the centering command. For any image in SGPro, you can right click it and, at the bottom, choose Save file as FITS. Having access to this will tell us almost immediately if there is an area of the sky combined with specific image trains that are producing backwards results.