Meridian Flip Fails

[Bill Richards]

[X] Is the issue reproducible?
[X] Are all prerequisites that are mentioned inside the manual met?

Which Version are you running? NINA version 1.10 HF3 and ASCOM Platform 6.5 SP1

Description

I have a CEM40 mount and have been using NINA to control it for almost a year. I started using the meridian flip feature 4-5 months ago and was thrilled with how well designed it was and how well it worked. I only get to image once or twice a month so I only used it maybe 6 or 7 times through July. It always worked perfectly and I was just about ready to trust that it could do its thing with me waking up to watch over it - until last weekend. When it got to the point where it commands the mount to do the flip, the mount didn’t move and NINA threw an error. I thought maybe it was a fluke, but it happened again last night - twice. Once this occurs, NINA gets lost in the weeds. The meridian flip process will not complete and cannot be canceled (something else that probably needs consideration). It’s basically hung and requires a Task Manager process kill, then restart everything from scratch.

When this was working reliably before, I was using NINA 1.10 HF1 and HF2, along with the prior version of ASCOM drivers (6.4). Last month, I noticed my mount was running 2 year old firmware so I updated it to the latest version, which required moving to ASCOM 6.5. And then I noticed that NINA 1.10 HF3 was out so I updated to that, too. I don’t know which update broke it, but it’s a good bet that one of those updates is the culprit.

Steps to Reproduce

• Connect NINA to a CEM40 mount running the latest firmware (https://www.ioptron.com/Articles.asp?ID=318)
• Slew to a target near the east side of the meridian and start tracking
• When the meridian flip process commences, it will hang at the point where it issues the command to the mount as shown in the attached screen shot.

Expected behaviour

The reposition command to the mount should cause the mount to do the meridian flip.

Actual behaviour

NINA displays an error message and locks up.

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[Stefan B]

Hi Bill,

this error popup seems to be coming directly from the mount driver. There are two problems inside the first log - setting the side of pier and then slewing to the target to do the flip. When this fails there is a retry mechanism to retry it again after a minute for a couple of times, but it looks like this will never succeed if the mount driver doesn’t accept these commands.

I remember having some problems reported by iOptron users after some firmware update, but I can’t recall which version that was and if this was fixed in the meantime.

[Bill Richards]

Hi Stefan,

Thanks for the reply. What do you recommend to resolve this problem? I'm running the very latest iOptron firmware and driver.

Best regards,

Bill

[Stefan B]

I will ask in the community on the discord server if anyone is having similar issues and could help out. Unfortunatley I don’t own any iOptron mount to check what the problem could be.

[Bill Richards]

Stefan - apparently, upgrading the mount firmware reset the meridian settings to their default values which were incompatible with what I had programmed in NINA. After setting the mount to stop tracking at 5 degrees after the meridian, the meridian flip worked as expected. I tried it twice during the day but am fairly confident it will work once I have clear skies at night.

Thanks again for your timely responses.

[Bill Richards]

This issue was not a bug - it was the result of meridian settings in the mount getting reset after doing a firmware update.

[Stefan B]

Hi Bill,

glad you got this sorted. I wanted to point to the meridian flip settings and the article we have (https://nighttime-imaging.eu/docs/master/site/troubleshooting/ioptron/) today, but you already figured it out!

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