M46 & NGC 2438, PIC Mount Control 1st Light, UHC-S, 17 Feb 2014 (David Dearden)

Celestial hemisphere: Southern · Constellation: Puppis (Pup) · Contains: M 46 · NGC 2437 · NGC 2438

M46 & NGC 2438, PIC Mount Control 1st Light, UHC-S, 17 Feb 2014

This is first light for my homemade PIC mount controller. My imaging skills are a bit rusty (after being down for more than 3 months!), but I am very pleased with the guiding ability of the controller. It is at least as good as the stock old one (and it has over voltage correction and will slew at 25x sidereal), and probably will improve as I get used to it. Of course, it may soon be superseded by PICGOTO (I hope). Chiller not in use, CCD at 7 °C. I'm also using PHD2. This isn't the first time with it, but it's probably the first time with the "release" version and I'm very happy with it also. There is a lot of moon tonight and probably will be clouds soon, but this target is pretty moon-tolerant. Focus is probably a little soft as my FCUSB needs adjustment and I couldn't use it. I was lazy and didn’t record all the detailed processing information I usually do. I’m just happy to be out imaging again at last.

Date: 17 Feb 2014

Subject: M46 (open cluster) and NGC 2438 (planetary nebula)

Scope: AT8IN + HPS coma corrector

Filter: Baader Planetarium UHC-S

Mount: CG-5 (Synta motors, PIC mount controller)

Guiding: 9x50 Finder/Guider + DSI Ic + PHD 2.2.1

Camera: DSI IIc no chiller T = 7 °C)

Acquisition: Nebulosity 3.2.0, no dither

Exposure: 2x300 s + 35x180 s

Stacking: Neb 3, bad pixel map, bias included, normalize first, trans+rot align, 1.5 SD stack.

Processing: StarTools + CS6 + Noel Carboni

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Status	Basic success
Started	...
Astrometry.net job	8656093
PixInsight job	n/a
PixInsight queue size	n/a
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M46 & NGC 2438, PIC Mount Control 1st Light, UHC-S, 17 Feb 2014

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M46 & NGC 2438, PIC Mount Control 1st Light, UHC-S, 17 Feb 2014

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