Focuser Cassegrain ASA/Keller
The Primary Focuser of the ASA/Keller Cassegrain is located in f3/1200mm. It is driven by a Faulhaber motor and linked to an encoder all triggered by a SmartFocus controlbox and software.
The Primary Corrector (diagram by P.Keller): For fast speed and huge fields. The prime focus is permanently installed in front of the secondary mirror and by removing the secondary in its holder you allow the light path to reach the prime focus.
Switching between the 2 focal configurations takes only 1 minute. The spot diagram shows a field diameter of 64mm, so you are ready even for very large CCD's with this telescope. The backfocus is 79.31 mm measured from the front of the lensring.
For the SBIG ST10XME the 79.31mm are reached by (5mm Frontring+25.5mm f3-Adapter+7.2mm Spacerring distance on 2-Zoll Adapter+24mm Filterwheel+17.6mm SBIG-CCD distance)
The Secondary Focuser is located in f9/3600mm. It is driven by a L4118X1404 motor and parallel linked to the stepper motor driver SMCI33 by Nanotec and the Amardillo controller Seletek , which is ASCOM compatible. The focuser is driven for fast movements by a selfmade controlbox.
Inside of an extension tube (90mm lenght/optical path), which is linked to the focusertube, ASA integrated a novel and removeable secondary corrector/(flattener/coma) (1x) lens (10.2cm tubediameter) designed by P. Keller.
The Secondary Corrector (diagram by P.Keller): These are the spot diagrams for the 2-lens corrector, which is placeable in the secondary focuser as a flattener and coma corrector. This corrector does not change the focal length. Full usable field is 80mm diameter. The backfocus is 139.57 mm measured from the center of the lensassembly.
For the SBIG ST10XME the 139.57mm are reached by (82mm Center of Secondary-Corrector-Lens to Frontring+16mm f9-Adapter+0mm 2-Zoll Adapter+24mm Filterwheel+17.6mm SBIG-CCD distance)
MaximDL5.07/ASCOM control: The new Seletek controller (Amardillo) wasn't designed for the nanotec stepper motor L4118X1404. But it is succesfully driven by MaximDL and the following parameters in the Seletek Focuser Software: Halfstep mode, Motor mode Lunatico, 55% power while moving, 0% power on hold, 25 millisec between steps and at 12V. At 12V the motor would draw, with its coil resistant of 2 Ohm, 6A current, which will most likely burn the circuit of the Amardillo controller! So the current was limited by a secured power supply in a 12v/1.5A version, which limits the current to 1.5A all on the way to the stepper motor.
Temperature correction: The controller harbors two output ports, the MAIN and the EXP and contains an internal temperature sensor.
The focuser is calibrated via the Seletek (Amardillo) MAIN port, correcting the optical system. It is also linked to a second external sensor/LM60, which is itself sticked by alutape to the primary Lomo mirror in the Cassegrain.
In addition the cooling-fan of the mirror in the back of the cassegrain is triggered via the EXP port based on the measured temperature differences, in order to equilibrate the temperature gradient between mirror and environment.
Here a view to the whole Seletek Amardillo controller installation, surrounding the temperature corrected mirror and secondary focuser
The secondary focuser received additionally a small controlbox, based on a joystick potentiometer (10 KOhm) and a small circuit in order to generate 0-12Volt analog signals. The stepper driver uses the range of 0-10Volt to adjust the stepper frequenz.
The housing contains an additional red pushbutton to generate a high +12V signal flank, which itself activates the stepper motor driver SMCI33 motor profile while no computer is running.
A closeup of the stepper driver and its wiring... all at 12Volt power. (An additional connection of the COM to Input 1 is required for the activation of the focuser by the red pushbutton of the controlbox and is not shown on this picture)
Parallel usage of joystick/SMC133 and software/Amardillo: The joystick controller/SMC133 and the Amardillo controller/MAIN port are parallel wired via A, A/, B, B/ . This enables their equal usage by the joystick and the softwares.
The direct, powerful mechanical construction enables very fine adjustable lifts of at least 6 kg weight. The focuser is moved in microsteps of minimal (0.01mm) lenghts and may stepless triggered to full speed by the joystick.
The various controllers of the focusers. From left to right: Cass Primary Focuser/Smartfocus, Cass Secondary Focuser/Homemade-Nanotec, ED100 Focuser/Feathertouch
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