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G`day everyone. I am the happy owner of a 12" inch Meade with the Jr. kit, a ServoCAT Gen 3 plus an ArgoNavis. Been a visual mostly, but used a ZWO ASI 1600MC/C with a 200 SkyWatcher over an HEQ5 for some imaging, with no much luck. For lack of space I had to sell the 200, keeping the HEQ5 and the ZWO As I also used the 1600 for some planetary imaging with some decent results, I was thinking of selling the HEQ and going on the road of Electronic Assisted Astronomy and possible some (lucky) imaging as the subproduct, using the existent ASI1600MC/C and purchasing a ASIAIR with the money from the HEQ. So, the question is: did anybody successfully connected the ServoCAT with the ASIAIR? Google search were inconclusive and scarce; I could only find this in ZWO forum: https://bbs.zwoastro.com/d/15122-asiair-plus-with-servocat-and-servofi-wi-fi-controller Any help will be much appreciated. Sincerely, Ricardo Calcagno Argentina.

Hello all. I have begun holding public viewing sessions at my observatory, using my dob that uses both ArgoNavis and ServoCAT. After showing the guests the physical telescopes, I then take a few minutes to do the required two star alignment with the dob. During the alignment process, the guests get restless. I have done enough reading through the support materials for the both the AN and the SC to know that it is perfectly acceptable to leave the AN powered on for at least a few days between viewing sessions so that the alignment achieved during the first session can be used for the second session. So I could go out on a clear night a day or two before the public session and get the dob all aligned. However, I am not sure of the details of this process so I am hoping to get some pointers. AN So at the first session, I do the two star alignment. Before walking away from the scope, does it matter at what menu level I leave the powered up AN? Should I leave it in MODE ALIGN STAR or go up one level to the top operating mode level? SC I do NOT want the scope tracking the second alignment star between sessions because it might bang into something. So should I: power down the SC; or leave the SC powered up but use the E-Stop toggle switch on the front of the SC (gen 3); or leave the SC powered up but disengage the gears? Finally, at the start of the public viewing session, when I undo whatever I have done to the SC above, although the AN should have retained alignment, the dob will no longer be pointing at the last object being tracked at the end of the first session (i.e., the second alignment star). Does the system automatically correct for this "inconsistency?" Thanks in advance for any guidance you can provide. Paul

My question is regarding the coiled cables for the hand-pad. Can 2 coiled cables be linked together? If so, would a special connected be required? Thanks, Mike

Hi to Spectroscopy Group members. Re: selecting a suitable guide star when collecting spectra in a sparce star field. Hampshire Astro Group often find it difficult to identify a chosen star when collecting high resolution spectra on their 640mm R-C plus Lhires spectrograph setup. A narrow pattern of stars is not always identified by platesolver. We have found it useful to call up Aladdin and then select Sindbad. Suggested by Steve Broadbent, our outgoing Chair. Kind regards. Alan Fowler (www.hantsastro.org.uk)

After many years of storage in a dry shed, I’ve been trying to get my 15” Nightsky Dob fitted w/ ServoCat Jr. up and running again powered by a 9AH gel cell battery. It was working fine the first couple years, and I brought both handpad and ServoCat box indoors, and stored them in a dry closet about 12 years ago. PROBLEM today: When handpad set to jog it passes all the tests, moving correctly in AZ and Alt., however in slew mode the Alt motor just starts spinning in the correct direction, but won’t stop till power connection is stopped. Most times 3button stop or unplugging handpad won’t stop it running, so I must quickly loosen spring and disconnect power. I know communication between setting circles and Argo Navis is fine and I can correctly locate DSO’s manually. This is just a problem in the ServoCat box or handpad. All my manuals and updates in Tools are dated 11/04/2003. Should I attempt to reprogram the ServoCat box? Any ideas on what would cause this problem?

Where is the version 7 update for servocat located? Mickey

Good Morning All: Windows 10 and 11 does not seam to support old USB ports out of the box. I have experanced this with Win 10 and Win 11, I would get a port error with Sky or SCU. I found runnings widows update would fix the problem. I have had this issue on two windows 11 pro and one windows 10 machine. So when I have this problem I just rerun windows update. Best Regards, Tim

I'm embarrassed to say this but I just discovered a bug when using ServoCAT-Sky to download parameters to an upgraded version 7 Gen2 ServoCAT. This ONLY applies to Gen2 and only applies if an upgrade to version 7+ has been done (which would require a download of the parameters). I thought in the past that there was a bug where when you enter the required change in the ServoCAT-Sky motor "ENCODER" value - changing it to 1000 (this is due to a hardware difference between Gen2 and 3)... that documentation suggested to enter that value - then the ratio to be downloaded - and then repeat entering the 1000. I had seen where in entering the ratio alone it corrupted the value. But today I discovered that the actual ratio value is converted to the nearest lower 1000 value! So for example I was entering a value of 3254.... but when I later went back and checked it, it was actually 3000 that was downloaded! I subsequently did an upgrade on another Gen2 and found the same thing - value entered 7254, value in the ServoCAT was 7000. So if this happened to anyone else: this can mean a pretty severe inaccuracy in tracking. GOTO might not be impacted as the algorithm tries to resolve any differences... but tracking for sure. So - first apologies for not seeing this before. If anyone had me to the upgrade you are welcome to schedule to send it back for me to confirm the correct values and to re-load them if incorrect. There's an easy way to confirm the right values using Pete Eschmans excellent SCU program to read out the parameters ---- but of course that does require the originally supplied serial cable/adapter and a good quality USB adapter. For those that have done it on their own I'd recommend you check the values using SCU. Note this is not a bug in the ServoCAT, rather it is a bug in the utility to download parameters to the ServoCAT. Gary Myers StellarCAT

I am happy to announce that we have begun shipping ServoCATs. The first delivery shipped to DocTelescope in Italy. If you have never heard of, or seen, a DocTelescope product, check them out at www.doctelescope.com. They are works of art. We will be contacting customers on our request list in the order that they were received.

Hello everybody, it seem that there is no way to let me control via Ascom my SC/Nexus DSC (not pro). People that can do that they use Argo Navis. It is OK for me to replace my Nexus with the Argo Navis to control the system with Ascom but in my current system I have the 40.000 steps encoder. If I replace my Nexus with the Argo Navis is it necessary to change the encoders also? Thank you for your help. Filippo

Hello Gary and everybody, I would like to ask a question about a problem I described in the past. I tried to optimize my system for astrophotography. I recognized some backlash in my system. Gary gave me some very important advices so the problem is less important than before but there still is something wrong. The gears have no backlash and also the reductions, in my opinion they work well. When the system is still and I try to move the shaft with my hands everything seems strong with a very small amount of backlash, absolutely acceptable, so I could not explain the reason why when at low speed I change the direction, I have to wait 15 or more seconds to see a changing in the directions. The .dat file has been updated as Gary told me so the problem does not depend on it. I have a theory and I want to share it with you. I show you a video (please let me know if you can see it properly). When I change direction (here is at high speed) the gear moves in the other direction quite quickly with a very small amount of backlash. The problem is that even if the gear starts to move in the opposite direction the structure starts to move after a certain amount of time. This “angle” when the roller rotates but the structure is still, is the reason that let me wait several seconds before I see in the ocular or in the camera the movement. In the video the roller starts to rotate in the opposite direction but the telescope starts after a while. I really don’t know what is the reason of that but in my opinion this is something that I believed was backlash of the gears, but actually it is not. Probably it depends on my structure. There is a sort of delay between the movement of the roller and the action on the structure. What do you think about it? Thank you for your help. Have a good day. Filippo

I have 10 of these left. It is a new Gen3 Hand Controller with nice plastic card showing functions as well as an extra long coiled connection cable. Original price $199. Christmas Sale: $159. Write to me at k9rx@... for info or to order one. Priority Mail shipping in the US should be around $14 and should have it there in just a few days. Picture on request. Gary Myers, StellarCAT