Voyager

Voyager is a software to simplify and automate astrophotography. This allows the entire equipment to be controlled and programmed by a PC. This makes it easy to make long recording sequences fully automatic.

4.12.2019: 1st attempt
Installing the software was easy. However, there were problems with the connection to the telescope and the SteelDrive Focuser. Despite various efforts, I did not get it up and running. Even the software supplied by Baader Planetarium SteelGo could not connect to the SteelDrive. SteelDrive was recognized in the selection but when connecting it there was a timeout and the connection did not succeed.

8.12.2019: Firmware update
I received a new firmware from Baader Planetarium support. After upgrading the SteelDrive II firmware, the SteelDrive II Focuser worked with the SteelGo software without any problems.
Therefore, I thought that updating the Celestron firmware could also be useful. The update worked without an error message, but the telescope could not be started afterwards. There was only the error message Err: Model Num.

10.12.2019: Update
After consultation with my dealer and technicians, the StarSense hand controller is irreparably defective and must be replaced. A quick test with the original Celestron AVX hand controller showed that the telescope works perfectly with it.

11.12.2019: Without StarSense
I have now connected the old hand controller to the telescope. Unfortunately, I still could not control the SteelDrive Focuser. It was connected but was in a save mode and could not be controlled.
Only for testing I tried it without the focuser and programmed a sequence. This all seems to work now. But I could not test it because the telescope could not be moved because it was not set up. In the next clear night I'll see if everything works. I'm very excited...

16.12.2019: SteelTrack / SteelDrive II
Today I received support from Baader Planetarium. After a short TeamViewer session on my computer it workedso far. The SteelGo software could easily control the SteelDrive and also receive the data from the temperature sensor. So far everything is fine. The SteelDrive could also be controlled with the supplied Ascom software.
In the evening I wanted to control the SteelDrive with the Voyager software. But that didn't work, I always got a timeout. And this despite the fact that the settings were identical to the Ascom software supplied by Baader.

8.1.2020: Baader SteelDrive II via TheSkyX
After following all advice from Leonardo from Starkeeper and still not being able to connect the SteelDrive to Voyager, I installed the SteelDrive II plugin for TheSkyX. In Voyager I used TheSkyX for focusing. That worked and Voyager was able to connect the SteelDrive via TheSkyX. But since I didn't have the camera plug-in for TheSkyX, I could only test it with the simulator.

9.1.2020: TheSkyX Camera Plugin
I have now installed the camera plugin for TheSkyX and controlled the camera and the SteelDrive via TheSkyX. That's working. Unfortunately the weather conditions were too bad to run a sequence. I was able to start the sequence, but on the PlateSolve stopped it because probably too few stars were visible or the exposure time (had only chosen 1s which is probably too little) was too short.

13.1.2020: Nice weather
Today finally the weather was good and so I tried to program a sequence and let it run. I had to correct a few things. The exposure time for plate solving was too short, there were too few stars visible for it to work. And I also had to make a few corrections with the camera setting and temperature control.
After that I was able to run the sequence successfully. Now I have to edit the captured images, I'm curious to see how the result is.

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