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Moon Avoidance & Prioritisation - Global Settings

General Site Support

Asatron

Monday, 25 October 2021

3 Replies

537 Visits

Votes

Undo

Roboscope's wants to delivery the best data possible but obviously we cannot just image when the moon is down so we have set Lorentzian based moon avoidance on our system to get the best out of the system in all Moon phases.

We are pretty aggressive with our moon avoidance settings in all filters apart from the HA. This will mean we image very little at all around full moon in all but the Hydrogen Alpha filter.

Moon avoidance:

Lum - 120 & 14
G,B & OSC 120 & 10
Red - 110 & 10
OIII - 110 & 5
SII - 100 & 5
HA - 85 & 5

The first number represents the minimum distance away from the moon that the object will be on full moon (day 14)

Priorities:

0 = HA + OSC
1 = SII OIII + (moon down jobs - using OSC cameras)*
2 = RGB
3 = Luminance + (moon down jobs - using Mono cameras)*
4 = Comets

*Syndicate & hosting members only setting - Choosing moon down when booking a job requires careful thought, especially with objects that have limited time over the horizon limits. it should never be used for all jobs as its simply not a good use of the pier.

We have added some quick graphical representations below so you will get an idea of what the number do to the shape of the bell curve when you alter them but if anyone would like the excel spreadsheet that you can adjust yourself then please message me:

Please ignore my dylexia wherever possible, just be thankful I can control my Tourettes ;)

Things to do, so little time!

Asatron

7 months ago

#5076

Votes

Undo

Thanks Steve for the explanation.

So it controls the profile of the bell shape, where higher numbers give a shallower, less steep gradient. One more question. Does the scheduler on each pier share a global set of moon avoidance parameters, or, can each pier have its own?

Cheers,

Ray

Morning Ray

Most piers will most likely fall within the new numbers,we will 100% know in a few weeks after the next full Lunar month

But to answer your question:

The first number, when this number is lower (say 5 instead of 14) it does indeed give a sharper bell, this allows us to image much closer to the moon whilst its in its smaller phases with all filters, whilst still offering the required protection as it gets into the larger phases with for example the Luminance filter
Yes each pier can have an individual moon avoidance setting :)

Kind regards

Steve

Ps for anyone else that may not have noticed, we have updated/tweaked our moon avoidance setting for broadband imaging across all piers, Prioritisation remains the same

Please ignore my dylexia wherever possible, just be thankful I can control my Tourettes ;)

Things to do, so little time!

NoMoreCloudyNights

7 months ago

#5049

Votes

Undo

Thanks Steve for the explanation.

So it controls the profile of the bell shape, where higher numbers give a shallower, less steep gradient. One more question. Does the scheduler on each pier share a global set of moon avoidance parameters, or, can each pier have its own?

Cheers,

Ray

NoMoreCloudyNights

7 months ago

#5043

Votes

Undo

Hi Steve,

Dumb question of the day. What is the number following the number of degrees of moon separation that you show?

I think I understand, however, so far I've been unable to find anything anywhere that describes using anything other than the separation angle when it comes to the scheduling of jobs. Maybe you are not making use of the Ekos observatory control system.

There maybe trouble ahead....

Cheers,

Ray