ToupTek AFW 8x1.25" filter wheel - Need Help! - Forums

📷 photo_2026-01-15_18-25-36 (2).jpg📷 photo_2026-01-15_18-25-36.jpg📷 photo_2026-01-15_18-25-36.jpgHi everyone!
I recently bought a ToupTek AFW 8x1.25" filter wheel. While mounting the camera, I made the mistake of removing the wheel — I later realized I could have fixed the camera without taking it off. Now I can’t figure out the correct route for the little elastic rubber belt.

The wheel doesn’t spin when connected: only the central shaft turns, but it doesn’t catch the rubber belt, so the filter wheel itself doesn’t move. I’m sure there’s a specific path for the belt, but I forgot to take a photo before disassembling it… and now I’m stuck!

Has anyone dealt with this before or knows the proper belt routing? Any help would be really appreciated!

From what I remember from the last time I had mine open and from the picture in the manual, the rubber “belt” goes around the outside of the filter wheel, it doesn’t thread in anywhere, have you tried that?

Tony Gondola · Jan 15, 2026, 06:17 PM
From what I remember from the last time I had mine open and from the picture in the manual, the rubber “belt” goes around the outside of the filter wheel, it doesn’t thread in anywhere, have you tried that?

yep, now is spinning :-)

But it never stops….

That's correct, the motor moves the belt around so to spin the FW carousel.

andrea tasselli · Jan 15, 2026, 06:35 PM
That's correct, the motor moves the belt around so to spin the FW carousel.

I mean, calibrate doesn’t works for ascom diagnostic, and I try to use goto it’s never stops, spins forever.

Don’t know maybe the IR sensor now, the wheel never find its place. I updated the firmware but with no luck.

Forever spins :-(

If i is spinning non stop it's the IR sensor which is blocked out (or non working). I seem to remember there was an issue with the firmware too but I never had that issue (but others, yes).

andrea tasselli · Jan 15, 2026, 07:23 PM
If i is spinning non stop it's the IR sensor which is blocked out (or non working). I seem to remember there was an issue with the firmware too but I never had that issue (but others, yes).

Thank you for taking the time, yes I updated the firmware, but with no luck can’t see any blinking light while the wheel spinning. Will check tomorrow with Artesky which options are available.

Grazie/Thank you

You can't see in IR, do you? So check that the sensor aligns with the holes at the edge of each filter receptacle. It's near the roller that spins the wheel around. Check also you are properly powering the wheel as it is quite finnicky about the amperage since it takes it from the USB (and use a USB 3 port directly and not through hubs or such). If you reset it or simply remove power it should return to position 1, so check that it does. Probably you need to recalibrate it, too.

andrea tasselli · Jan 15, 2026, 08:19 PM
You can't see in IR, do you? So check that the sensor aligns with the holes at the edge of each filter receptacle. It's near the roller that spins the wheel around. Check also you are properly powering the wheel as it is quite finnicky about the amperage since it takes it from the USB (and use a USB 3 port directly and not through hubs or such). If you reset it or simply remove power it should return to position 1, so check that it does. Probably you need to recalibrate it, too.

I’ll check the alignement holes, once I understand how does it works :-)

Actually the moment I power up (via direct usb 3.0) it start spinning but never find the 1 position.

It’s normal I can’t see any light even without the wheel in place? Pressing Calibrate does nothing and go to a position lead to the infinite scrolling.

This is what I see 📷 image.png

Guess I got the point :-)

📷 image.png

It's the chip labelled U9, the IR emitter. Put the wheel in place with the rubber cable around the edge ans bolted down with the screws on the central hub (quella in ottone). each filter position should have a corresponding hole aligned with its center. Move the wheel by hand (unpowered) and see whether the carousel's holes align with the emitter. If it is anything like mine each position has a slighter higher resistance to the movement so that it (sort of) "clicks" in position. If you have an all sky lens (as often supplied with ASI cameras, planetary only) and an IR filter (850nm) you should be able to film whether the emitter does its job or not.

Also wanted to point out that I assume the photos above are old. The rubber o-rig goes around the outside of the wheel, it doesn’t go through the drive as your photos show it doing. As Andrea pointed out, the drive wheel(s) simply bear upon the rim. Maybe a dumb comment but I wanted to make sure.

I had the same issue when I got mine last year. A YouTube video from a Touptek shows they remove the wheel to attaches to the camera but in that video there’s no belt. It took me over an hour to figure out how to put it back.

If it’s still not working I can open mine saturday and take pictures. I remember the belt makes some some kind of S shape under the small circuit board.

Eric Gagne · Jan 16, 2026, 12:29 AM
I had the same issue when I got mine last year. A YouTube video from a Touptek shows they remove the wheel to attaches to the camera but in that video there’s no belt. It took me over an hour to figure out how to put it back.
If it’s still not working I can open mine saturday and take pictures. I remember the belt makes some some kind of S shape under the small circuit board.

Exactly the same video that misleading me…. Now I found the shape for the rubber belt, but the IR sensor is not working :-)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Kp_uydaAeXw

Do NOT follow this video for the Touptek 8x1.25" wheel; it is absolutely not necessary to do this in order to mount the camera (exactly as with the ZWO). The photos are recent, taken a few seconds before being posted in this thread. However, now, despite updating the firmware and readjusting the rubber belt, there is no way to calibrate the wheel and have it recognize position 1. It is possible that, while working to reattach the rubber belt, I damaged the IR sensor—I don’t see any little light blinking through the holes—so yeah… I may have made my life quite a bit more complicated.

Eric Gagne · Jan 16, 2026, 12:29 AM
I had the same issue when I got mine last year. A YouTube video from a Touptek shows they remove the wheel to attaches to the camera but in that video there’s no belt. It took me over an hour to figure out how to put it back.
If it’s still not working I can open mine saturday and take pictures. I remember the belt makes some some kind of S shape under the small circuit board.

I put 3 hours into it myself :-) lol. Now the wheel spins, and I’ve positioned the two holes above the sensors so that the wheel starts from a “known” position; nevertheless, if I try to run the calibration, nothing happens, and if I use the command to go to a specific slot the wheel just keeps turning without ever stopping, essentially it has no idea where it is. I really shouldn’t have followed the steps shown in the video; I realized that, with horror, the moment I noticed there was no belt at all in the video. And from any position it starts in now, I have no idea, since the wheel spins perfectly, how the IR signal could fail to pass through the holes. I really think I’ve damaged the chip. :-(

I was happy to have taken my first image with the L filter and to have nailed the focus :-) right up until I tried to check whether the filters were parfocal and attempted to move to the R filter.

📷 image.pngAt least the camera is working, in the worst possibile scenario I’ll have to buy another 239 Euro new wheel. Since this hobby isn’t expensive enough already, breaking my gear at time t0 is a new experience; apparently I had to add this notch to my learning process… and to the creation of black holes in my bank account lol.

📷 image.pngThis is the current path of the belt that lets the wheel get enough grip to rotate; the central shaft is the motor that drives the belt. I haven’t found any alternative belt paths and I’m hoping it’s maybe just the belt position that’s blocking the sensor, but I haven’t figured out how to reroute it differently from this and still let the wheel rotate.

You are blocking the sensor with the belt!

andrea tasselli · Jan 16, 2026, 07:32 AM
You are blocking the sensor with the belt!

I love this answer, give me hopes, still I can’t find an alternative route for the belt… I wrote to the touptek support, let’s see if the answer me with actrual diagram.

/italian stuff below :-)

Ma @andrea tasselli la tua risposta mi da speranza è quello che avevo pensato anche io a sto punto :-)

Maybe this thread could be useful for someone else in the future!

Se togli il circuito che copre il motore si capisce meglio.

andrea tasselli · Jan 16, 2026, 08:02 AM
Se togli il circuito che copre il motore si capisce meglio.

Yeah, I really should take the board out, but honestly I’m starting to get a bit freaked out by this kind of work. So I guess I need to unscrew the two screws that are holding the top board in place, let’s call it the upper board, so I can get a better look at everything underneath. That way I can figure out the best way to route the drive belt around the wheel. I’ll think about it for a bit, because to be honest I’m scared I’ll end up breaking it even worse than it is now. But yeah, I think you’re right. :-) Just scared

andrea tasselli · Jan 16, 2026, 08:02 AM
Se togli il circuito che copre il motore si capisce meglio.

But yeah, that sounds pretty good too. Anyway, I’m just gonna go ahead and do it now and see what happens. It doesn’t work like this anyway, so worst case scenario, it still doesn’t work.

E grazie mille per il tuo tempo Andrea, molto apprezzato :-) Grazie grazie

📷 image.pnghere we go, this is a puzzle :-)

Ci sono due led IR, U9 e U10 (confermare) e i due fotodiodi U2 e U1 (scheda superiore) per confermare la positione. Rimetti la ruota in posizione ma senza la scheda superiore e guarda ad una configurazione che permette il trascinamento della routa senza oscurare ne' U9 ne' U10.