Maybe the worst guiding I have ever seen on my system..... - Forums

Topic starter

Jan 4, 2025

Yesterday, it seemed like there were poltergeists in my equipment. I cannot remember ever seeing my guiding so unstable as it was yesterday.
Have you ever seen guiding errors looking like this?

Tonight - all is perfect 🤷‍♂️

Engaging

SolarVortex3562

Jan 5, 2025

Christian Bennich:
Yesterday, it seemed like there were poltergeists in my equipment. I cannot remember ever seeing my guiding so unstable as it was yesterday.
Have you ever seen guiding errors looking like this?

Tonight - all is perfect 🤷‍♂️

The only time I get star shapes like that is when something bumps into my mount, causing it to shake very quickly, creating those star streaks.

Well Written Concise

SemiPro

IOTD Staff

Jan 5, 2025

Clearly you caught a group of UFO's in formation! It's the only logical answer.

The boring answer could be wind, especially given your pixel scale and the length of your Newtonian.

Well Written Engaging

Dunk

Jan 5, 2025

Clearly you caught a group of UFO's in formation! It's the only logical answer.

100% its Aliens. Do you live in NJ by any chance?

SemiPro

IOTD Staff

Jan 5, 2025

Dunk:
Clearly you caught a group of UFO's in formation! It's the only logical answer.

100% its Aliens. Do you live in NJ by any chance?

No, but its very respectful of the aliens there to apply the standard FAA regulation navigation lights to their spacecraft!

Philippe Barraud

Jan 5, 2025

What guiding software are you using ?

Derek Vasselin

Jan 5, 2025

I'll get this as well from time to time. If it happens, it's usually just 1 or 2 frames and the rest are fine.

My guiding works fine otherwise, so best I can tell is that it's a random gust of wind.

Well Written

Christian Bennich

Topic starter

Jan 5, 2025

That’s also where I have “landed” - wind gusts.
Can’t seem to find any other plausible reasons for this for now.

Wei-Hao Wang

Jan 5, 2025

Have seen something like that for a few times, all because of strong wind. There may be nothing wrong (other than wind) with your system.

Tony Gondola

Frequent contributor

Jan 5, 2025

It's wind or a random night critter…

Photon_Collector

Jan 5, 2025

Christian Bennich:
Yesterday, it seemed like there were poltergeists in my equipment. I cannot remember ever seeing my guiding so unstable as it was yesterday.
Have you ever seen guiding errors looking like this?

Tonight - all is perfect 🤷‍♂️

Its wind, my guiding looks like that when wind kicks up above ~7 mph

Christian Bennich

Topic starter

Jan 5, 2025

I have just never seen my guiding behave like that in wind before.

But I did have gusts the other night.
Furthermore I have raised my scope 20 cm in my “astro tent” so some of the dew shield will now be above the top of my enclosure in some scenarios, so that might have shown up as “new”behavior for me 😛

Considering lowering my setup again, but the added height has given me some extra time closer to the horizon 😀

Oscar

Jan 5, 2025

Christian Bennich:
I have just never seen my guiding behave like that in wind before.

But I did have gusts the other night.
Furthermore I have raised my scope 20 cm in my “astro tent” so some of the dew shield will now be above the top of my enclosure in some scenarios, so that might have shown up as “new”behavior for me 😛

Considering lowering my setup again, but the added height has given me some extra time closer to the horizon 😀

better to accept a half hour less imaging time having the scope lowered, than to lose possibly a lot more than that with random gusts of wind catching onto your dew shield.

Christian Bennich

Topic starter

Jan 5, 2025

Yeah - but I actually lost 2,5 hours of data. But after spending more time investigating I am beginning to suspect that something else might have been strange as well.

I can see that the data before and after the meridian seems strangely off in how the images are rotated.

I think I will write off this night as being haunted by aliens 😂