The setup is the usual, ASI 224MC, TSO ADC, N250/1200, HEQ5 with the home made motorized focuser and the home made arduino noszogtató mount guider. I would like to call this the soapbox project — it is mounted inside a soap box, though in Hungarian and Romanian we use soapbox to denote compact and dumb cameras too.
2019.06.07. Jupiter 2019-06-07-2144 7 pipp g3 ap1 reg1 szep
2019.06.07. Jupiter 2019-06-07-2226 5 pipp g3 ap1 reg1
2019.06.07. Jupiter 2019-06-07-2326 8 pipp g3 ap1 reg1 szep
2019.06.07. szaturnusz 2019-06-07-2352 1 pipp g3 ap6 Drizzle15 p5
The soapbox device:
a soapbox
almost like a Pear product, white but does not cost a fortune
powered by an arduino nano
the soapbox in action
the soapbox in action
top right corner…
same with Saturn this time
The arduino source code used to pull down the ST4’s input pins, through an optocoupler much like here:
#include "timer.h"
#define TIMER_INTERVAL_MS 10
auto timer = timer_create_default();
#define TIMER2_DIVIDER 21 // for some reason that extra 1 is needed, and below, comparing to 1 works, to zero does not
int timerDivider;
const int READ_BUFFER_LEN = 15;
char readBuffer[READ_BUFFER_LEN];
#define RA_PLUS 9
#define RA_MINUS 10
#define DEC_PLUS 11
#define DEC_MINUS 12
typedef struct HEQ5_Pin {
int pinNumber;
int inPairWithPinNumber;
int timeLeft;
int currentState;
} HEQ5_Pin;
HEQ5_Pin heq5Pins[5];
//---------------------------------------------------------------------
void pins_add(int pin, int ms){
if (pin > 4){
return ;
}
if (pin < 0){
return ;
}
if (ms > 0){
// valid ms, increment the time left
heq5Pins[pin].timeLeft += ms;
if (heq5Pins[pin].inPairWithPinNumber > 0){
for (ms =0; ms < 5; ms++){
if (heq5Pins[ms].pinNumber == heq5Pins[pin].inPairWithPinNumber){
heq5Pins[ms].timeLeft = 0;
}
}
}
}else{
//invalid ms given, stop the motion
heq5Pins[pin].timeLeft = 0;
if (heq5Pins[pin].inPairWithPinNumber > 0){
for (ms =0; ms < 5; ms++){
if (heq5Pins[ms].pinNumber == heq5Pins[pin].inPairWithPinNumber){
heq5Pins[ms].timeLeft = 0;
}
}
}
}
}
//---------------------------------------------------------------------
void pins_process(){
for (int i=0; i<5; i++){
if (heq5Pins[i].timeLeft > 0){
if (heq5Pins[i].currentState != HIGH){
digitalWrite(heq5Pins[i].pinNumber, HIGH);
heq5Pins[i].currentState = HIGH;
}
}else{
if (heq5Pins[i].currentState != LOW){
digitalWrite(heq5Pins[i].pinNumber, LOW);
heq5Pins[i].currentState = LOW;
}
}
}
}
void timerCallback(){
for (int i = 0; i<5; i++){
if (heq5Pins[i].timeLeft > 0){
heq5Pins[i].timeLeft -= TIMER_INTERVAL_MS;
if (heq5Pins[i].timeLeft < 0){
heq5Pins[i].timeLeft = 0;
}
}
}
timerDivider--;
}
void setup() {
// put your setup code here, to run once:
readBuffer[0] = 0;
Serial.begin(9600);
while (!Serial) {
; // wait for serial port to connect. Needed for native USB
}
heq5Pins[0].pinNumber = RA_MINUS;
heq5Pins[0].inPairWithPinNumber = RA_PLUS;
heq5Pins[1].pinNumber = RA_PLUS;
heq5Pins[1].inPairWithPinNumber = RA_MINUS;
heq5Pins[2].pinNumber = DEC_MINUS;
heq5Pins[2].inPairWithPinNumber = DEC_PLUS;
heq5Pins[3].pinNumber = DEC_PLUS;
heq5Pins[3].inPairWithPinNumber = DEC_MINUS;
// sanity check led
heq5Pins[4].pinNumber = 13;
heq5Pins[3].inPairWithPinNumber = 0;
for (int i=0; i<5; i++){
heq5Pins[i].timeLeft = 0;
heq5Pins[i].currentState = LOW;
pinMode(heq5Pins[i].pinNumber, OUTPUT);
digitalWrite(heq5Pins[i].pinNumber, heq5Pins[i].currentState);
}
timerDivider = TIMER2_DIVIDER;
timer.every(TIMER_INTERVAL_MS, timerCallback);
}
void reportStatus(){
Serial.print("STATUS ");
for (int i=0; i<5; i++){
if (heq5Pins[i].pinNumber == RA_MINUS){
Serial.print("ra-,");
};
if (heq5Pins[i].pinNumber == RA_PLUS){
Serial.print("ra+,");
};
if (heq5Pins[i].pinNumber == DEC_MINUS){
Serial.print("dec-,");
};
if (heq5Pins[i].pinNumber == DEC_PLUS){
Serial.print("dec+,");
};
Serial.print(heq5Pins[i].timeLeft);
Serial.print(" ");
}
Serial.println("STATUSEND");
}
void loop() {
if (Serial.available() > 0) {
char c = Serial.read();
if (c == '#'){
readBuffer[0] = 0;
}else{
if (c == '/'){
//process the command pin, #P,TTTTTTT/
// #rap,TTTTTT/
int pinIndex = readBuffer[0] - 48;
if (readBuffer[0] == 'r'){
// rap, ran
if (strncmp(readBuffer, "rap", 3) == 0){
for (int pi = 0; pi<5; pi++){
if (heq5Pins[pi].pinNumber == RA_PLUS){
pinIndex = pi;
}
}
}
if ((strncmp(readBuffer, "ran", 3) == 0) || (strncmp(readBuffer, "ram", 3) == 0)){
for (int pi = 0; pi<5; pi++){
if (heq5Pins[pi].pinNumber == RA_MINUS){
pinIndex = pi;
}
}
}
}
if (readBuffer[0] == 'd'){
// decp, decm/n
if (strncmp(readBuffer, "decp", 4) == 0){
for (int pi = 0; pi<5; pi++){
if (heq5Pins[pi].pinNumber == DEC_PLUS){
pinIndex = pi;
}
}
}
if ((strncmp(readBuffer, "decm", 4) == 0) || (strncmp(readBuffer, "decn", 4) == 0)){
for (int pi = 0; pi<5; pi++){
if (heq5Pins[pi].pinNumber == DEC_MINUS){
pinIndex = pi;
}
}
}
}
char * timeString = strstr(readBuffer, ",");
int timeAdd = 0;
if (timeString){
timeAdd = atoi(timeString+1);
pins_add(pinIndex, timeAdd);
}
Serial.print("ECHO: ");
Serial.println(readBuffer);
Serial.print("pin[");
Serial.print(pinIndex);
Serial.print("] += ");
Serial.print(timeAdd);
Serial.println("");
}else{
//continue to concat
int n = strlen(readBuffer);
if (n < READ_BUFFER_LEN-2){
readBuffer[n] = c;
readBuffer[n+1] = 0;
}
}
}
};
timer.tick();
pins_process();
if (timerDivider <= 1){
timerDivider = TIMER2_DIVIDER;
reportStatus();
}
}
