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+ | My journey of learning, and exploration. | ||
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+ | ===== Overview ===== | ||
+ | I initially started working on the 20" telescope at the Eileen Collins Observatory two semesters ago. I was a student in Observational Astronomy and became fascinated with all things space. | ||
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+ | The following details the work done on the telescope to bring it to it's full useful potential. | ||
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+ | ==== The Telescope ==== | ||
+ | The telescope has a long history. | ||
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+ | The telescope was used for years as a training device at CalTech before it was donated back to Corning Inc. It was stored for a time at the Museum of Glass and then donated to Corning Community College. | ||
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+ | As a prototype, the telescope was identical to the 200" telescope in most every detail, but it was never intended to be used for actual observing. | ||
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+ | When I took the class, I became interested in the telescope and was curious about it's operation. | ||
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+ | === Control System === | ||
+ | Before I go into the details of the repairs and upgrades, I want to give an overview of how the control system works. | ||
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+ | The telescopes primary control is through a DFM Engineering TCS system. | ||
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+ | Target selection and coordinate input is handled through a program called TheSky. | ||
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+ | Position input from the telescope and dome are tracked using three encoders located on the right ascention and hour angle of the telescope, and one connected to the dome. The encoders provide relative feedback to TCS which interprets position from the equipments start-up location. | ||
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+ | ==== The Curious Case of the Ever Turning Dome ==== | ||
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+ | The first problem that I encountered was that when dome tracking was turned on, and the telescope position was change, the dome would start rotation, but not stop. It would continue to rotate as long as power was still supplied to it. I obtained a copy of the observatory schematics and narrowed it down to the dome encoder system. | ||
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+ | The first part of the process of elimination was to check the security of all connections. | ||
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+ | I then placed a call to DFM who directed me to a few more places to look for the problem. | ||
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+ | I swapped the hour angle chip with the dome position chip, started up the system, and drove the telescope on it's right ascension axis. The dome began to move, and stopped exactly where it should. | ||
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+ | Replacing the bad chip with the new cured the problem. | ||
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+ | ==== System Upgrades ==== | ||
+ | ==== Main Camera ==== | ||
+ | Searching around the supply room, I was confronted with a box, upon opening I was surprised to see a high end Apogee AP-7 astronomical camera sitting there with all of its cables. | ||
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+ | As it turns out, the Apogee camera was put in storage after the original interface board malfunctioned. | ||
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+ | After receiving both the board and the new firmware, I installed it into the imaging computer, hooked up the camera, and fired up MaximDL. | ||
+ | We were now able to take long exposure images... up to a point. | ||
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+ | ==== Auto Guiding ==== | ||
+ | Another jaunt through the mysterious supply room found another box, inside it was two cameras and their controllers. | ||
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+ | The ST-4 camera connects to an interface box that can be connected to a secondary computer for remote control via serial link, or used stand alone. | ||
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+ | The imaging computer only had one serial port, and that was being used to connect to the TCS computer. Attempts for communication were made using a USB/Serial converter, but they failed miserably. | ||
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+ | Amazingly enough, it was able to communicate. | ||
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+ | ==== Future Upgrades ==== | ||
+ | There are a number of upgrades that I would like to have done to make this a truly research worthy telescope. | ||
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+ | I also plan on modifying the TCS software to allow external focus control. | ||