tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-37059793754121684952024-03-13T06:03:18.139-04:00OnStep Controller KitsGeorgehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15481902796555359085noreply@blogger.comBlogger2125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3705979375412168495.post-20365723979212723102021-10-27T18:10:00.001-04:002023-07-25T10:56:47.216-04:00<div style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: large;">What's OnStep Today?</span></div>
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<div style="text-align: left;">OnStep is an open source automated motion control system designed to operate the mountings under telescopes and other astronomical instruments. Its emphasis is on astronomy and astrophotography. </div><div style="text-align: left;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: left;">Also second not insignificant aspect of OnStep is cost. On commercial automated telescope mounts the electronic control systems add 50 to 70% to the price of an unautomated system. In my experience, too many of these systems have proven to be short lived and unreliable, repair parts are often unavailable or horribly overpriced. Repair when available, is equably expensive, often less than competent and requires shipping heavy equipment thousand of miles or for folks in other markets across oceans. Other mounts, names like, Byers, Takahashi, Astro Physics, Losmandy, etc. can retain their mechanical soundness well beyond that of their limited control systems and are due for an update. And of course nothing sadder than a expensive mount that is now a doorstop due a failed system.</div><div style="text-align: left;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: left;">There is nothing magic about the design of the systems. Anyone with basic hand skills can work with them. The magic is in the operating software. Developed as freeware by Howard Dutton and constantly improved by members of the <a href="https://onstep.groups.io/g/main" target="_blank">Google OnStep </a>group over the last decade it has been adopted as a commercial product by unrelated enmities in Asia. Yet it remains mainly a user directed and designed project. Do-it yourself is generally the least expensive path to converting or adapting OnStep to your project. An I encourage those interested in OnStep to take that approach.</div><div style="text-align: left;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: left;">I see my part as administering a group buy to save on the cost of parts for building the controllers. However, being too wise or lazy to administer group buys, I front the money to inventory the parts for commonly built controllers and recover the costs when kits are shipped. I use Paypal, they keep the books and assume performance on my part. </div><div style="text-align: left;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: left;">The economies of buying part in units of up to 1,000 is considerable. Much of the cost of individuals trying to source enough parts for one controller is in the shipping expense. Pretty much everything for a controller is manufacture or assembled in Asia and shipped by air. This usually entailed a lengthy wait for shipments. I usually have most of the parts on hand, so it's just a mater of how slow I am and at least you can complain to me personally about that.</div><div style="text-align: left;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: left;">The <a href="https://onstep.groups.io/g/main/wiki" target="_blank">OnStep Wiki</a> has much of the information you need to accomplish your project. Please note the "Pages" button at the bottom of each Wiki page. Using the button opens a drop down menu of informational and instructional pages.</div><div style="text-align: left;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: left;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: left;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: left;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: left;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: left;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: left;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: left;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: left;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: left;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: left;"> </div>
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Georgehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15481902796555359085noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3705979375412168495.post-58424705663863802282020-02-18T20:32:00.003-05:002020-02-25T10:28:01.670-05:00Let's Talk More Configuration.<span style="color: #222222; font-family: "roboto" , "arial" , sans-serif;">If you're here to order a kit go down to the </span><a href="https://www.blogger.com/blogger.g?blogID=3705979375412168495#editor/target=post;postID=4032578149788822080;onPublishedMenu=template;onClosedMenu=template;postNum=5;src=postname"><span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;"><b>first post</b></span></a><span style="color: #222222; font-family: "roboto" , "arial" , sans-serif;"><b>,</b> thanks. Come back here when you've got your build finished. The latest stuff is at the top.</span><br />
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<span style="color: #222222; font-family: "roboto" , "arial" , sans-serif;">Configuration, it's definition; </span><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: "roboto" , "arial" , sans-serif;"><i>an arrangement of elements in a particular form, figure, or combination, </i>doesn't tell us too much of what we're about here. What we are trying to do is to get the OnStep software to talk to <b>our</b> STM32 controller so it will make <b>our</b> mount do as we desire.</span><br />
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<span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: "roboto" , "arial" , sans-serif;">Well there's a few things you have to do before you continue here. If you haven't gone through the </span><a href="https://www.blogger.com/blogger.g?blogID=3705979375412168495#editor/target=post;postID=1635914285484804039;onPublishedMenu=allposts;onClosedMenu=allposts;postNum=3;src=postname" style="font-family: roboto, arial, sans-serif;"><b>prior post</b></a><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: "roboto" , "arial" , sans-serif;"><b> </b>on configuration do that first. The scarred veterans of that experience can continue.</span><br />
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<span style="background-color: white;"><span style="color: #222222; font-family: "roboto" , "arial" , sans-serif;">OnStep will work with just about any telescope mount you may imagine. But we can't do that right out of the box. It needs to be told the details of your mount. Configuration is what gives it its great flexibility. I guess it may be more accurate to say Howard Dutton & friends have designed OnStep with the flexibility to adapt to any configuration. All we have to do is to accurately communicate our mount's details to OnStep. </span></span><br />
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<span style="background-color: white;"><span style="color: #222222; font-family: "roboto" , "arial" , sans-serif;">If you have done this with OnStep versions before 3.16, it's time to learn it again. Gone is the Configuration Generator and ConfigXXX.h. If this is your first go you won't miss them. There is now just one Config.h file for all the OnStep controller designs. So here's how to use it.</span></span><br />
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<span style="background-color: white;"><span style="color: #222222; font-family: "roboto" , "arial" , sans-serif;">After you've down loaded </span></span><a href="https://github.com/hjd1964/OnStep/tree/release-3.16" style="background-color: white; font-family: roboto, arial, sans-serif;">OnStep-beta.zip</a> <span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: "roboto" , "arial" , sans-serif;">(ver. 3.16), move it into your Documents/Arduino folder and expand it. Go into your old OnStep folder and delete all the files. Open the OnStep-beta folder, copy all the files and folders and paste in the old OnStep folder. Good House Keeping tip: don't hang onto old versions of OnStep. The Arduino IDE will find them and get confused.</span><br />
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<span style="background-color: white;"><span style="color: #222222; font-family: "roboto" , "arial" , sans-serif;">When you open the OnStep folder you will see the Config.h file. Do your self a favor and save a copy of the native file as XConfig.h somewhere, just in case you have start from GO.</span></span><br />
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<span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: "roboto" , "arial" , sans-serif;"><span style="color: #222222; font-family: "roboto" , "arial" , sans-serif;">In the file, which should be opened in a text editor like Notepad, you will find, by my count, 103 "define" statements that together describe you mount's </span></span><span style="color: #222222; font-family: "roboto" , "arial" , sans-serif;">characteristics to Onstep. <b>Don't panic!</b> To get started you only have deal with about 20 of them. Yeah, it's like twenty questions and you know the answers, only OnStep d</span><span style="color: #222222; font-family: "roboto" , "arial" , sans-serif;">oesn't. OK, here an example for a fairly simple Vixen SP. </span><br />
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<li><span style="color: #222222; font-family: "roboto" , "arial" , sans-serif;">#define PINMAP STM32</span></li>
<li>#define SERIAL_C_BAUD_DEFAULT ON // needed for STM32</li>
<li>#define MOUNT_TYPE GEM</li>
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#define LED_STATUS ON // I like the light </div>
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<li>#define BUZZER OFF // I unlike the this</li>
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#define BUZZER_STATE_DEFAULT ON // </div>
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<li><div style="color: #222222; display: inline !important; font-family: roboto, arial, sans-serif;">
#define TIME_LOCATION_SOURCE DS3231</div>
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<li><span style="color: #222222; font-family: "roboto" , "arial" , sans-serif;">#define ST4_INTERFACE ON</span></li>
<li><span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">#define ST4_HAND_CONTROL ON_PULLUP</span></li>
<li><span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">#define TRACK_AUTOSTART ON // at least at 1st, I go w/ON</span></li>
<li><span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">#define TRACK_REFRACTION_RATE_DEFAULT ON</span></li>
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<span style="color: #222222;"><span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">That takes care of the first 41 define statements. Now we have to call up the </span></span><a href="http://www.stellarjourney.com/assets/downloads/OnStep-Calculations117.xls"><span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;"><b>spreadsheet</b></span></a></div>
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<span style="color: #222222;"><span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">and deal with statement 42; define AXIS1_STEPS_PER_DEGREE, et seq. [Didn't think you'd ever need that Latin, huh?</span></span><br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjtgwXjj9sJ1A2J6ouS0DKiUcmPiripA592mvW12N0p_ldHnSyVi8GjgF7ljpa4aUlNMKHFRzELXQz6DePXUpj1rJQxsn3x4IjtgqSpLOBaWwxYjZ4hsxStYxu_wwyuND9tAIcl8e95h_M5/s1600/SP_sheet.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="577" data-original-width="1158" height="318" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjtgwXjj9sJ1A2J6ouS0DKiUcmPiripA592mvW12N0p_ldHnSyVi8GjgF7ljpa4aUlNMKHFRzELXQz6DePXUpj1rJQxsn3x4IjtgqSpLOBaWwxYjZ4hsxStYxu_wwyuND9tAIcl8e95h_M5/s640/SP_sheet.jpg" width="640" /></a></div>
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<span style="color: #222222; font-family: "roboto" , "arial" , sans-serif;">The circled values should be transferred to you Config.h file as follows:</span><br />
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<li><span style="color: #222222; font-family: "roboto" , "arial" , sans-serif;">#define AXIS1_STEPS_PER_DEGREE 15360</span></li>
<li><span style="color: #222222; font-family: "roboto" , "arial" , sans-serif;">#define AXIS1_STEPS_PER_WORMROT 38400</span></li>
<li><span style="color: #222222; font-family: "roboto" , "arial" , sans-serif;">#define AXIS1_DRIVER_MODEL DRV8825 // driver model</span></li>
<li><span style="color: #222222; font-family: "roboto" , "arial" , sans-serif;">#define AXIS1_DRIVER_MICROSTEPS 64 </span></li>
<li><span style="color: #222222; font-family: "roboto" , "arial" , sans-serif;">#define AXIS1_DRIVER_MICROSTEPS_GOTO OFF // no µstepping during slews</span></li>
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<span style="color: #222222; font-family: "roboto" , "arial" , sans-serif;">Repeat for the Dec axis.</span></div>
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<li><span style="color: #222222; font-family: "roboto" , "arial" , sans-serif;">#define AXIS2_STEPS_PER_DEGREE </span><span style="color: #222222; font-family: "roboto" , "arial" , sans-serif;">15360</span></li>
<li><span style="color: #222222; font-family: "roboto" , "arial" , sans-serif;">#define AXIS2_DRIVER_MODEL DRV8825</span></li>
<li><span style="color: #222222; font-family: "roboto" , "arial" , sans-serif;">#define AXIS2_DRIVER_MICROSTEPS 64</span></li>
<li><span style="color: #222222; font-family: "roboto" , "arial" , sans-serif;">#define AXIS2_DRIVER_MICROSTEPS_GOTO OFF</span></li>
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<span style="color: #222222; font-family: "roboto" , "arial" , sans-serif;">// THAT'S IT FOR USER CONFIGURATION! You may want to come back and adjust things as you gain experience with your mount, but for now you should be working.</span> <span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">Now copy your edited Config.h over the native Config.h and go on to flash your controller.</span><span style="color: #222222; font-family: "roboto" , "arial" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
Georgehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15481902796555359085noreply@blogger.com0