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Post by Deleted on Nov 11, 2016 16:43:19 GMT
Hi Guys, just to let you know we have these inbound - should arrive approx. 15th November. They go pretty quick so just sign up for stock notification on the website if you want an alert. Here's the link: Hypercam IMX178 EAA camerathanks, Nick
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Post by davy on Nov 11, 2016 18:18:28 GMT
I was looking through the Altair astro website picking up the model numbers and specs and this camera,caught my eye 😃. We had spoke about the starvis sensor a while back and I put up some images from Sony website and I thought this is a camera I would like to get my hands on,, a big step up from the Samsung scb2000 of course it was only in CCTV cameras at the time but it shouted out big time for a cooling mod i thought, so I'm really pleased to see this camera coming on the scene,, One query I have is. When I modified my Samsung scb I went the route many folk had went with fan modification blowing air in to the casing,, I done extensive testing and found that you could get the internal of the camera cooler by blowing the hot air out of the camera,, maybe something to ask manufacturer to try out,, reverse the fan..
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Post by Deleted on Nov 11, 2016 18:44:11 GMT
The Hypercam draws air in through the side vents, and out through the back vent so you can call it a negative pressure system which I agree with you is more efficient. The electronics and heatsink all benefit from airflow. At night-time in the UK the sensor gets pretty cold with the fan running, around 5C in winter according to my cheap heat gun so far. To get a rough idea of cooling, you can test the sensor temp with a heat gun held against the front optical window, (the filter isn't IR blocking but before everyone says it, this isn't a very scientific method I agree). You can clearly see the difference in a stretched dark frame taken at room temp, and there's about 5C difference in sensor front surface temp with the fan running @ 1min recurring exposures on the IMX178 and IMX174 sensor. For solar imaging it's pretty handy, because it keeps everything cooler too. You don't really want temperatures of above 60C in any camera and solar imagers almost always use a diagonal which can cause the sun to strike the camera body and for things to get pretty hot mid-summer (I do a lot of solar imaging and I designed this for both solar and deepsky). Of course an airflow cooling method isn't as efficient as TEC, but it's a lot cheaper to implement. You could easily modify a Hypercam though. There's plenty of space inside for a 30x30mm square TEC unit between the heatsink and the cold finger (which contacts the sensor in the sensor chamber) and you already have the fan in place. In fact it would be as easy as undoing the heatsink screws, dropping the TEC unit in place and doing them up again perhaps with a little thermal paste on each side. The 12v leads can easily come out of the slotted vent holes. With a heatsink directly in contact with the cold finger, I'm surprised no-one else has tried modding these cameras yet to be honest, considering they're the ideal format for modding compared to having an external cooler which cools the whole casing, and the camera is so cheap for what it is Best, Nick
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Post by davy on Nov 11, 2016 19:42:26 GMT
Great info nick,,thanks for the heads up,,
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Post by ChrisV on Nov 20, 2016 2:18:49 GMT
So what are the pros and cons of your 174 v 178 cameras for live viewing of DSOs ? Beside being colour (178) v mono (174), is the difference just sensor size. Or is one better in terms of other things like sensitivity, amp glow etc.
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Post by Deleted on Jan 22, 2017 16:39:33 GMT
This was taken with the Hypercam IMX178 Colour. 14x300seconds on an Altair ED80-R refractor on an IOptron CEM60 mount.
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Post by davy on Jan 22, 2017 16:52:17 GMT
Great representation of what the camera can do in astrophotography.. would be nice to see how it would fair as a video camera,, with the hybrid systems just now it's a very fine line , This camera linked to astrotoaster is what I personally would like to see ,, the current technique for video astronomy is short exposure and stacking,, the starvis sensor is very nice and I've said it since I came across it in CCTV cameras before it hit astro camera's,, please someone try it with astrotoaster on short exposure,, I don't think we will be disappointed.
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Post by Deleted on Jan 22, 2017 22:35:28 GMT
I have a friend who is coming over soon with one so I could get him to give it a go..:-)
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Post by davy on Jan 22, 2017 23:06:57 GMT
Fantastic Andrew,, very interested in how it will work out in video mode. We have a different approach to what is video astronomy than others forums that use the eaa wording. Our definition of live video astronomy would be a webcam or video camera that gives as close to live view as possible with the likes of a CCTV converted camera that does internal stacking and produces n image. This is usually to a max of x1024 on sense up. Nearlive would be the likes of a usb camera that does external stacking via a computer to stream a near live image up to a maximum of 5 minutes,this would also incorporate a DSLR using e.g cannon utilities and astrotoaster or backyard Eos and astrotoaster or a lodestar and lodestar live.. but at five minutes exposure we really are pushing video to the limit and being honest it in my eyes is astrophotography but we try to accommodate to this limit. After five minutes it's deffo astrophotography lol. But it's all really down to honesty, when an image is posted it should be a frame from a video feed,,but usually folk tweak images in Photoshop so,, the age old dilemma is it ap or av lol. Davy
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Post by Dragon Man on Jan 23, 2017 11:50:23 GMT
300 seconds!!! That's 5 minute subs WOW! Not exactly what I would call Near-Live Video Astronomy but a nice pic all the same. Interesting how there is no core burnout so there must have been some fancy post-processing done to achieve that. Yes, it would be good to see what this camera can do at short exposures (30 seconds, 45 seconds, 60 seconds, & 120 seconds), and with no post-processing, just on-the-fly settings fiddles with.
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Post by mAnKiNd on Jun 8, 2017 5:38:17 GMT
The Hypercam draws air in through the side vents, and out through the back vent so you can call it a negative pressure system which I agree with you is more efficient. The electronics and heatsink all benefit from airflow. At night-time in the UK the sensor gets pretty cold with the fan running, around 5C in winter according to my cheap heat gun so far. To get a rough idea of cooling, you can test the sensor temp with a heat gun held against the front optical window, (the filter isn't IR blocking but before everyone says it, this isn't a very scientific method I agree). You can clearly see the difference in a stretched dark frame taken at room temp, and there's about 5C difference in sensor front surface temp with the fan running @ 1min recurring exposures on the IMX178 and IMX174 sensor. For solar imaging it's pretty handy, because it keeps everything cooler too. You don't really want temperatures of above 60C in any camera and solar imagers almost always use a diagonal which can cause the sun to strike the camera body and for things to get pretty hot mid-summer (I do a lot of solar imaging and I designed this for both solar and deepsky). Of course an airflow cooling method isn't as efficient as TEC, but it's a lot cheaper to implement. You could easily modify a Hypercam though. There's plenty of space inside for a 30x30mm square TEC unit between the heatsink and the cold finger (which contacts the sensor in the sensor chamber) and you already have the fan in place. In fact it would be as easy as undoing the heatsink screws, dropping the TEC unit in place and doing them up again perhaps with a little thermal paste on each side. The 12v leads can easily come out of the slotted vent holes. With a heatsink directly in contact with the cold finger, I'm surprised no-one else has tried modding these cameras yet to be honest, considering they're the ideal format for modding compared to having an external cooler which cools the whole casing, and the camera is so cheap for what it is Best, Nick Hi Nick, I'm thinking of implementing your suggestion on my Hypercam 178M, but I was wondering about possible electrical interference/noise caused by the peltier on the sensor, therefore negating any cooling benefits. How would you recommend I hook up a 12V power supply to the peltier to avoid any such issues? Many thanks, great idea if it works well! Minos
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Post by Dragon Man on Jun 8, 2017 6:52:10 GMT
Minos, It would be best to contact Nick directly at Altair through their email because Nick hasn't been here since last year and may never find your question. Feel welcome to sign up as a member in here too
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Post by davy on Jun 8, 2017 9:46:28 GMT
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Post by howie1 on Jun 8, 2017 23:19:30 GMT
I have a friend who is coming over soon with one so I could get him to give it a go..:-) I have a friend and her hubby who just moved to Eymet which is about 2 and half hours from you. She mentioned there's quite a few astro 'farms' around and keeps trying to get me to visit her there. Nice image of M42. cheers Howie
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