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INDI Library v2.0.6 is Released (02 Feb 2024)

Bi-monthly release with minor bug fixes and improvements

Astroberry Focuser with Adafruit Motor HAT

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After closer look I found out that RELEASE function is not implemented in C++ library. Therefore release is achieved by resetting all PWMs after stepper motor finishes its travel to destination. You can checkout the latest code from github for testing.
6 years 9 months ago #17132

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Today I mounted everything together and took the motor for a proper spin. I can confirm 14,000 steps is all I need for full travel.
The process takes about 225 seconds. It's rather slow, but I can live with it as my prime focus is mostly in. But if it is safe to increase speed, that would be nice.
I also found more backlash in my complete drive train. 100 doesn't appear to be enough after all, 300 or 400 should do the trick.
Final thought, as a driver for DIY focusers, other users may desire the ability to select within options the drive mode (Single, Double, Interleave Microstep) that best suits their choice of hardware. For instance if somebody chooses a stepper with 5:1 or even no gear reduction; they would probably benefit from Microsteps.
6 years 9 months ago #17133

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Excellent. I'll have a look right away.
6 years 9 months ago #17134

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I'm glad everything works for you.
The speed value cannot be higher than 255 and now the driver lets you set maximum 250. So it's rather the problem of high gear reduction ratio for the motor than slow speed. I will increase maximum backlash right away. Checkout the sources in 5 minutes.
Let me add selection of various modes in a future release.
6 years 9 months ago #17135

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It looks like resetting the PWM did the trick. Nice work!
6 years 9 months ago #17136

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I had a chance to use it tonight. And hats off to you Kaczorek, the driver works beautifully.
All I have left to do is address a few mechanical details. Even so the autofocus routine did settle on a good focus after about 10 shots.
Thank you very much.
6 years 9 months ago #17148

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Have a good time while focusing ;-)
The following user(s) said Thank You: Andrew
6 years 9 months ago #17156

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Joystick controls don't appear to be functional. Dialog will report Focuser aborted messages, but does not abort. Messages appear after reaching position. Focus In/Out reports nothing.
6 years 9 months ago #17186

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I will take a look at joystick controls. Abort focuser function is not implemented so it will not work.
6 years 9 months ago #17192

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Thanks Kaczorek. Take your time. This is just a report and I'm not even sure I will be using a joystick in this way.
6 years 9 months ago #17206

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Kaczorek,
I've run into an install problem. Can't obviously see what I've done wrong.
Start point INDI server already installed.
system update & upgrade performed.
wiring pi already installed - checked with $gpio -v returns version 2.32

Then running your compile from source script :
all steps run as expected with no errors until the last line
>make install
This returns:
CMake Error at /home/rob/astroberry-amh/build/libs/AdafruitStepperMotorHAT_CPP/tmp/libAdafruitStepperMotorHAT-gitupdate.cmake:136 (message):
Failed to unstash changes in:
'/home/rob/astroberry-amh/libs/AdafruitStepperMotorHAT_CPP/'.
You will have to resolve the conflicts manually


I can only think i've got a dependancy issue, introduced when I sudo apt upgrade/updated the system?

Also on further checking I note that there is a newer version of wiringpi - which have you?
Maybe i had an ADAfriuit library already installed within the other packages?

Also when I've started up the indi server again with:
indiserver -l /var/log/indi -f /var/run/indi -p 7624 indi_amh_focuser

i get
2017-06-14T22:59:42: startup: indiserver -l /var/log/indi -f /var/run/indi -p 7624 indi_amh_focuser
2017-06-14T22:59:42: open(/var/run/indi): No such file or directory.
2017-06-14T22:59:42: good bye

so it would seem the install failed to complete properly somewhere in the process? Before I reinstall everything from fresh, i wondered if there was anything obvious i'm missing, like a prerequisite?
6 years 9 months ago #17296

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Everything's OK. You need to remove libs directory from your build directory before every consecutive cmake run. The driver is using submodules and there's no easy way to do this. So you need to rm -rf /home/rob/astroberry-amh/build/libs everytime you recompile the driver.
Also make sure that you run sudo make install instead ust make install. Everything should work just fine when you follow these. If not, just let me know.
6 years 9 months ago #17297

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