We recently purchased an 8300-STT with the self-guiding FW8G-STT filter wheel. The imaging chip works fine as does the filter wheel, but when I switch to the guide chip I see no image at all - not even noise - just a black screen. HDMI and 9-pin cables are both installed and seem secure. Any hints for trouble shooting would be greatly appreciated. Thanks!
I should note we used the CCDOps software, and tested the chips in a dimly lit garage. This provided plenty of light for the imaging chip, but only a black screen for the guiding chip.
Have you tried pointing at a bright star in the middle of the main chip, then slewing the scope up (or down) so that the star falls onto the guide chip? The chip may be out of focus (it is movable, so may have to be focused). The focus procedure is in the manual. or, have you pointed the scope at the dimly lit twilight sky, and see if you get the guide chip flooded with light to produce a 'flat' image -- if nothing else (to see that light is being detected by the chip)...
Tim, I tried in the range of 0.1-10 seconds and got nothing but a black screen. I didn't think to save the image and try to stretch it to look for noise or send it to SBIG. That will probably have to wait for the weekend. There was enough ambient light in the garage that 0.1 seconds gave an image with no problem on the imaging chip. Thanks
Kevin, if you really see the blank images from your tracking CCD, ie. all pixel values are zero, than there is high probability you have bad HDMI cable. Please use another one and let us know. You should use high quality cable. You can take dark frames, etc., but in any case, there has to be some pixels' data inside the image and not ADU = 0. Jan
Jan, The HDMI cable was the one that came with the camera, and it does appear to be bad. I tried another and it does work, though the connection on the camera end is a bit finicky. One other thing I was wondering (maybe a bit picky and unrealistic, I admit) - is there anything that can be done to make the shutter a bit quieter during guiding? The continuous clicking begins to wear on the nerves after a bit, especially while trying to enjoy the starry sky. I also don't want to annoy neighbors at 2am! Thanks
Kevin, does this mean that your guiding CCD work well now ? If not, please put here one image. Also, I think, we cannot do anything with the shutter clicking. Jan
Jan, Yes the guiding chip seems ok - it was apparently just the HDMI cable that came with the camera. There's definitely a learning curve for us relative to use of a DSLR. But our initial images already clearly show the benefits!
Kevin, as said several times here, SBIG got wrong cables last year, but didn't know about it, of course, so those cables were distributed. So, if somebody clearly see that the images are completely blank, ie. all pixels ADU = 0, this is probably due to bad cable and/or your guider (FW8G or RGH) is disconnected from the main camera body. Regards, Jan
