Lacerta M-Gen User Manual
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Lacerta M-Gen User Manual

Stand-alone autoguider
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1 ABOUT THE HARDWARE .............................................................................................................................. 2
1.3.1 Specification of the HC and Camera ..................................................................................................... 5
1.3.2 Imaging specification of the Camera ..................................................................................................... 6
............................................................................................................................................. 8
2 NEW FEATURES IN FW. 02.50 ....................................................................................................................... 9
3 ABOUT THE USER INTERFACE ................................................................................................................. 11
3.2.1 Menus .................................................................................................................................................. 12
3.2.2 Variables (parameters) ........................................................................................................................ 12
3.2.3 Profiles ................................................................................................................................................ 14
4 PARTS OF THE SOFTWARE, FUNCTIONAL UNITS .............................................................................. 15
(FS) ......................................................................................................................................... 17
4.4.1 When is the file written? ...................................................................................................................... 17
5 MENU TREE..................................................................................................................................................... 20
5.1.1 AutoExposure (AE) screen ................................................................................................................... 22
5.1.2 AutoExposure program list screen ...................................................................................................... 24
5.1.3 Random Displacement (RD) screen ..................................................................................................... 27
5.1.4 Misc. screen ......................................................................................................................................... 29
5.1.5 Power off screen .................................................................................................................................. 35
5.1.6 Guiding menu screen ........................................................................................................................... 36
5.1.7 Guider setup screen ............................................................................................................................. 37
5.1.8 Star Search screen ............................................................................................................................... 38
5.1.9 Live View screen .................................................................................................................................. 40
5.1.10 Guiding screen ................................................................................................................................... 42
6 MORE DETAILED ABOUT... ........................................................................................................................ 54
6.1 ... CCD
........................................................................................................................................... 54
6.2 ...
LACERTA M-GEN
Stand-Alone AutoGuider
User's manual for Firmware 02.50
Created by Zoltán Tobler
Last updated: 27 November 2017

Table of contents

.................................................................................................................................... 2
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.................................................................................................................................... 11
(AG) ................................................................................................................... 15
(AE) ................................................................................................................. 16
(
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................................................................................................... 19
............................................................................................................ 21
................................................................................................... 55
............................................................................................... 11
(RD) .............................................................................. 16
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  • Page 1: Table Of Contents

    LACERTA M-GEN Stand-Alone AutoGuider User’s manual for Firmware 02.50 Created by Zoltán Tobler Last updated: 27 November 2017 Table of contents 1 ABOUT THE HARDWARE ..........................2 1.1 P ............................ 2 ARTS OF THE DEVICE 1.2 P ..........................4 OWERING THE DEVICE 1.3 E...

  • Page 2: About The Hardware

    1 About the Hardware 1.1 Parts of the device The “LACERTA M-GEN Stand-Alone AutoGuider” (referenced as LMG) consists of the following parts:  Handcontroller (referenced as HC). It has the whole user interface (buttons, indicator LEDs, LCD) and does the main functions like Autoguiding, Random Displacement, AutoExposure etc.
  • Page 3 o Canon EOS compatible shutter output (3.5mm stereo jack conn.) o Camera port (RJ-45 type female conn., can be used any (max. 2m) UTP cable too but the supplied cable is preferred. Note: NEVER try to use a cross cable!) o DC power input (5.5/2.1mm size) (12V nominal, 9-15V), tip positive (polarity-protected) o ST-4 compatible autoguider output (RJ-12 type female conn.)

  • Page 4: Powering The Device

    o 1 piece of Camera cable, similar to a straight UTP cable. Used to connect the Camera with the Handcontroller. It’s length is around 1.8-2m. o 1 piece of “ST-4 autoguider” cable (white) to connect the Handcontroller and the mount with ST-4 compatible autoguider input. About 1.5 meters of length.

  • Page 5: Electrical Characteristics

    1.3 Electrical characteristics 1.3.1 Specification of the HC and Camera  Values for HC with BOOT version $14 or above. Note: All DC input current values are for a nominal 12V input. These currents change with the input voltage. unit Notes Min.

  • Page 6: Imaging Specification Of The Camera

    1.3.2 Imaging specification of the Camera ADU means: Analog to Digital conversion Unit (= a digital step) means: electron RMS means: standard deviation (statistical); Root Mean Square unit Notes Min. Typical Max. CCD active pixel area 752 × 582 pixel 3.65 ×...

  • Page 7: Turning On And Off The Device

    1.4 Turning on and off the device After the device is first supplied with power source it goes to sleep (power-down) mode, nothing can be seen and there are no output signals. The cables can be safely plugged in or out.

  • Page 8: Update Mode

    1.5 UPDATE mode Also known as BOOT mode. The device always starts in BOOT mode by pressing ESC, but doesn’t start the firmware if You hold ESC button for more than 1 second. If there is no valid firmware on the device, UPDATE mode will start anyway with the text ‘NO FIRMWARE’.

  • Page 9: New Features In Fw. 02.50

    2 New features in Fw. 02.50 o Exclusive AG output mode has been extended with variable dead time and it is applied between each AG signal change. (This is a workaround for some mounts that can be stuck in one direction while AG signal ‘suddenly’ changes to the opposite way.) o A constant 0.2s AG signal idle time is inserted between RD movement and AE exposure end.
  • Page 10  Exclusive AG out mode was wrong for the manual mode. From 02.12: o Astro Photography Tool is able to inform M-Gen about the externally controlled exposure, so that M-Gen saves guiding positions to create guiding diagrams. o (Mech./star) emulation mode is available. (It has been developed only for testing indoor.) More on this at the switch’s description.

  • Page 11: About The User Interface

    3 About the user interface All the screenshots in this document may be one of a previous firmware release and are only for demonstration purposes. The only exceptions are the ones that are detailed written about, in the screens’ paragraphs. These have a colored border. 3.1 Buttons and LEDs On the front panel of the HC there are 6 buttons and 6 so-called indicator LEDs next to them.

  • Page 12: Menus

    This “screenshot” below shows the main menu with the “Exposure” item selected on it: Certain items behave differently. There are number, time and text types etc. Text type items can lead to a submenu or are to do some function (like a button), while other (number or time) types store a value that could be edited/changed and are called parameters or variables.
  • Page 13 To store the new value press SET again. The new value immediately takes place SET in most of the cases. Doing so we also Storing the new value. leave the editing mode. To discard the new value edited (to hold the old one) press ESC.

  • Page 14: Profiles

     Text This type can not be edited as the other. Holds a fix text or the ‘value’ (state) of it can be changed with the SET button. So the text can show the value or state of a parameter. Can be a so-called button item that does/starts some function.

  • Page 15: Parts Of The Software, Functional Units

    4 Parts of the software, functional units There are some well defined functional units in the device. In the next sections You can read about these functional units for the sake of a better transparency. 4.1 AutoGuiding function (AG) The main function of the device is Autoguiding. It has its own process (runs independently of the other (including the User Interface)), handling the Camera is it’s job exclusively so the program of the Camera is the part of this functional unit.

  • Page 16: Autoexposure Function (Ae)

    The Firmware handles sudden lose of the Camera but it is not safe to power-off it that way, it might damage some circuit part in the Camera. 4.2 AutoExposure function (AE) The Autoexposure functional unit is also a separate part of the software. On its dedicated screen can be set up, started and stopped etc.

  • Page 17: Filesystem (Fs)

    On photos taken without RD some small pattern of the background noise is a typical effect. This may be caused by the changing gravitational flex in the system (using a guide scope and a separate imaging telescope) or image movement (rotation) around the guiding star due to not enough precise polar alignment.
  • Page 18  AutoExposure state changes.  Some variable value’s change. - 18 -...

  • Page 19: Cooperation Of The Functional Units

    4.5 Cooperation of the functional units The three main functional parts (AG, RD, AE) need to work synchronized if the RD is enabled. This communication is shown below in a simple diagram (the time axis goes downside): Autoexposure Random Autoguiding (AE) Displacement (RD) (AG)

  • Page 20: Menu Tree

    5 Menu tree The menu is structurized around the function units. From the main menu You can access these main functional units’ control screens, besides other subscreens and menus. Here is a drawing of the important part of the menu structure. Main menu Power off Autoexposure...

  • Page 21: Screens And Functions Detailed

    5.1 Screens and functions detailed Some explanation for the next (screen-descriptor) sections and its items:  With blue color the item as it apperas on the screen;  after it in caret, separated with comma (if it has): o type of it (see 3.2.2); o limits (minimum and maximum);...

  • Page 22: Autoexposure (Ae) Screen

    5.1.1 AutoExposure (AE) screen To control the EOS-compatible shutter output lines (3.5mm stereo jack). One program can be set up at a time on this screen, started, paused / continued and stopped. The screen items are the following:  Shots to do : (decimal, 1 ...
  • Page 23 Used to start or stop the program. At stopping the program is interrupted regardless to its current state and the shutter lines go inactive immediately. It is possible to stop the program while it and the DSLR is in ML state. In this case they will be out of synchron, but the DSLR may timeout from ML state and the synchron is okay from that time.

  • Page 24: Autoexposure Program List Screen

    Below there are some example diagrams for the running of the AE program in different cases. (Time axis is the horizontal line.)  Operation without ML (“mirror lockup” = 0.0) Events „Start” AE state … wait expo. wait expo. Exposure line Focus line 1 sec exp sec...
  • Page 25 ‘shots to do’, ‘wait time’ etc. There is a mode for them displayed on this screen, which can be changed by LEFT/RIGHT buttons. Mode defines the behaviour of a program slot when a multi-type program set is started. On this screen, a star indicates which slot is currently active. Running ONLY ONE slot’s program: Select one slot with the cursor and press SET.
  • Page 26 Start the program set as shown on the right. First, one expo is taken from slot 1, then slot 2 is activated. Second, one expo is taken from slot 2, then slot 1 is activated again, since 3 and 4 are unused. This is repeated until no more expos are left in slot 1 (after the 10 cycle).

  • Page 27: Random Displacement (Rd) Screen

    5.1.3 Random Displacement (RD) screen About the meaning of RD see 4.3. Below are the screen’s items and detailed descriptions:  Enable : (switch) profile To enable or disable the RD function. If enabled, rigth after the currently running exposure (in AE) has ended this generates a new guiding position for the guide star.
  • Page 28 The RD positions are fix so reproducable. The positions are indexed in the device that starts from 0 at power-on. This first position (offset) is always (0,0). Later the index grows but can’t be reset to 0 currently. If You stop the autoguiding and restart again, remember that the star may be located somewhere but not where it was at starting the autoguiding.

  • Page 29: Misc. Screen

    5.1.4 Misc. screen This screen holds every menu and settings that may be accessed rarely.  Display : (submenu) Leads to LCD and LED indicators’ settings.  Mode settings : (submenu) This submenu contains switches for the different modes of operation of the functional units.
  • Page 30 Display settings screen 5.1.4.1 The LCD and LED indicators’ settings are here:  LCD backlight : (decimal, 0...99 %) global The intensity of the LCD backlight brightness. The value is used in application mode of the device, the LCD backlight is always on full in update mode. ...
  • Page 31 Note: it may occur that the correction (guider imaging) frequency is so frequent that both of the correction signals could not be put out fully. In this case the new correction signal gets active and the current is interrupted. It may delay the DEC corrections if the RA must be corrected continuously.
  • Page 32 − working modes are reset (off, including mask warning) − active profile is set to 0 − LED and LCD brightness and contrast is also reset - 32 -...
  • Page 33 Date and time screen 5.1.4.3 You can set the realtime clock and date here. The format is displayed on the screen: year- month-day and hours:minutes. The seconds are also displayed but can’t be changed. After setting a new date the device checks it and limits the day value.
  • Page 34 The files in the list are ordered by their unique ID. This value is constantly increasing with every new file creation and gives the ability to indentify all new files from the older ones (from even those that were downloaded to PC and then deleted). The newest file is always the first file in the list (at the top of the other) regardless to its creation time value.

  • Page 35: Power Off Screen

    Auto shutdown : (switch) If checked, M-Gen will automatically stop the functions and turns off as soon as the given time is reached. This time is shown (and editable) after the “at” (@) character, while the current time is shown below it. You can check on this switch if the time is 2 minutes past “now”...

  • Page 36: Guiding Menu Screen

    5.1.6 Guiding menu screen This screen (and its subscreens) holds all the functions and settings for autoguiding.  Current guiding : (subscreen) This leads to the main Guiding screen (5.1.10.1).  Live View : (subscreen) To enter LiveView screen, where the full CCD surface can be monitored in realtime. ...

  • Page 37: Guider Setup Screen

    5.1.7 Guider setup screen This screen holds the parameters of the guiding optics and mount, so “guider” in this context does not mean the autoguider device. These values are needed by some function that does not know anything about the used system and giving the values (approximately) helps them.

  • Page 38: Star Search Screen

    5.1.8 Star Search screen After setting some guiding parameter (that You want to use) an automatic star searching function can be started from here. The guiding parameters are the imaging parameters like analog gain and the guiding exposure time. This two main parameters are responsible for the limiting magnitude and the precision of determining the star position.
  • Page 39 Other notes: The automatic star search method uses a 16 pixel width window. Stars having this huge image or defocused spots may not result in a hit point or more points close to eachother, though a minimum of 8 pixels limit is used to avoid multiple detection. Double stars within this size may be identified as single stars.

  • Page 40: Live View Screen

    5.1.9 Live View screen The screen does that it’s name suggests. The entire CCD surface is monitored on the LCD in realtime so far as a two-state display can: there are on- (bright) and off- (dark) pixels on it. The on- pixels show that the given part of the CCD is brighter than a threshold value.
  • Page 41 faint star so as a hot pixel, use this mode carefully. Moving slightly the telescope will show which pixel is due to a star (it moves with the scope) and which is a hot pixel (stays in place). The new ‘havg’ mode can be used if single hot pixels are disturbing but don’t forget it suppresses very faint star’s highest pixel value as well and they may become almost invisible.

  • Page 42: Guiding Screen

    5.1.10 Guiding screen One of the most important screens is this one. From here You can start, stop, parametrize the autoguiding, run the calibraton etc. Due to the much function and parameters this screen is splitted into pages that is displayed at the right bottom as “...
  • Page 43 held. The latest 48 drift values are shown for the latest 48 frames, for each axis. One time step (one frame) is one pixel horizontally while vertically the drift values are scaled to the tolerance limit set. The tolerance interval is shown right next to the frame with two short lines, the size of it is ±4 pixels to the zero.
  • Page 44  AG start AG stop : (button) To start or stop the autoguiding. When starting, the latest star position will be the guiding center, where the star is to be held. Later the guiding center can be overwritten with a new value (for example by the RD function).
  • Page 45 5.1.10.2.1 Calibration screen The screen displays all of the current calibration data if there is one. If there is no calibration data present, “no data” text is shown (see screenshot at right) Calibrate and two options are possible: starting a new calibration with the button and Recall last restoring the previous one with the...
  • Page 46 Ortho The o value is displayed on the screen as , in percent. If this is 100% the orthogonality of the two direction vectors is perfect. The value can be selected but does not have any function yet. The error in optimal circumtances (no wind, good mount) is generally under some percent. The orthogonality is well enough above 90%, this means that the angle betweent the axes is less than 6 degrees.
  • Page 47 The timeout of the next measurement.  Star : (string) You must enter the direction here, where the star for the measurement is. This is essential to get proper polar error direction displayed. (Southern/Northern, Eastern and Southern part of the sky (near celestial equator) are the options.) ...
  • Page 48 Example of a DEC calibration (on the northern hemisphere): We calibrate with DEC Saving start position DEC should be moved New vector calibrated towards south for DEC Example of a DEC calibration with RA: We calibrate with RA Saving start position RA should be moved to New vector calibrated east (slowing down)
  • Page 49 Guiding parameters page (RA and DEC: 3/5 and 4/5) 5.1.10.3 The next two pages have the same items, one page is for the RA and one for the DEC axis’ parameters. These settings are independent for the axes. These parameters define the guiding behaviour of an axis. The parameters can be experienced with time and should be only trimmed later for some fix guiding configurations.
  • Page 50 0 Inside the tolerance interval there will be no correction signal but outside of it the device will try to correct the drifto to zero. 1 Inside the tolerance interval there will be no correction signal but outside of it the device will try to correct the drift back to the tolerance border only.
  • Page 51  Time : (real, 0 ... 99.99 seconds) profile Holds the backlash time.  Apply : (decimal, 0 ... 99 %) profile Time The physically applied percentage of value. You can trim the applied backlash time with this. Doing a precise (or more) amount of corrections may make the DEC oscillate (slowly) if the mount’s reaction is not that exact.
  • Page 52 (If You don’t see the star again after ‘Camera ON’, the guiding optics or mount must be moved or rotated.)  more.. : (subscreen) Goes to the screen below (2 extra page). If the NEW image processing mode is selected, the last FWHM value (“diameter of the star”) is shown above the guiding window as "W=□.□□", the unit is pixels.
  • Page 53 An example for understanding the ‘Full wnd. / Partial’ modes: Let we have a double star in the guiding window (probably using a short focal length guiding scope). The full window processing calculates the following position: The bottom star is the one we want to use for guiding. Accidentally a close star appears in the guiding window as the mount moves ‘upwards’.

  • Page 54: More Detailed About

    6 More detailed about... 6.1 ... CCD binning Hereby I try to describe the hardware binning operation modes of the Camera. The following four modes can be selected: Binning CCD area Binned pixel size (μm) mode (pixels) 1 × 1 752 ×...

  • Page 55: The New Image Processing Method

    6.2 ... the NEW image processing method From Firmware 2.10 this option is available on the extra (5/5) page of the guiding screen. This method is much more complex than the default (OLD) one. I list the advantages and drawbacks of this mode. Advantages: ...

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