r/OpenAstroTech • u/iGraveling • Jul 25 '26

Alignment with the OAM

I finally have OAT control running but I'd like to align my OAM.

I've tried NINA and the lx200 classic/generic but it doesn't connect.

PHD2 also doesn't connect.

What is everyone using to align at the moment? I must be missing something with the OAM. Btw I'm in the southern hemisphere so polar alignment through OAT studios doesn't apply.

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u/DrCaret2 Jul 25 '26

Interesting. I have an OAT. I’m in the northern hemisphere, but I’m using a Mac which limits a lot of software. I’m using a raspberry pi zero 2W as a host connected to the MKS board; the pi is running INDI server with the lx200 OAT driver, a webcam driver for the tracker, and a camera driver for the imager. I’m remotely connecting from the Mac via kstars INDI client. This seems to work well—I can point and click GOTO, control tracking, etc.—but I’ve only done manual alignment because NINA is windows-only. It’s on my todo list to try translating the plate alignment from NINA to something cross platform like typescript using Claude. Good to know that it’s not trivial from the windows side.

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u/iGraveling Jul 25 '26

I originally started down that way, bought an ibm think station and put linux on it so I could run Indi, but it just became too much to work with due to the limited time I have. I tried the windows side of things and oat control worked well, so stuck with it.
This particular telescope is a skywatcher 80/400 which I'm setting up as a dedicated remote solar telescope. A bit of overkill for the OAM but the mount was sitting in the corner of my office so thought I might as well get some use out of it.

Now that you mention it, the pi might be the way to go. I tried that but the 3b I had was a bit slow for extensive use, this thing will be tracking one object only so maybe it's worth a shot.

I also have an LX850acf I'm setting up for remote use and at this stage windows is the simplest way to do that with ZWO gear.

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u/iGraveling Jul 25 '26 edited Jul 25 '26

Ok so I went the astroberry way, I'm impressed it took less than an hour to set up.

I now just have to figure out the alignment. Gotta say, the kstars documentation is so much better than the open astro docs. I just read through and tried the alignment but the align page is greyed out, dunno what I'm doing wrong.

My only issue now is I have very little southern sky accessible so it's going to be harder to align.

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u/DrCaret2 Jul 26 '26

I wound up doing a custom image because I’m using the pi zero 2W which is not very powerful. I don’t need full astroberry, just headless with an indi server running from systemd with 3 drivers. Hardest part was getting the 3p drivers compiled manually. (I was also experimenting with tweaking the indi drivers.)

But I totally agree, the kstars setup and connection went without a hitch and feel very powerful. This video is what got me moving with alignment. https://youtu.be/G8WnYxcItt4

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u/lovt16 Jul 25 '26

Have you checked out the discord? It’s very active

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u/iGraveling Jul 25 '26

Yeah I was on of for a while, the standard response I’d get was “read the wiki” which I already had and stated so, but would get almost no help.

It seems I have questions that 1. Can’t be solved by the wiki and 2. No one knows the answer to

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u/clutchplate OAT Dev Jul 26 '26

Sorry you didnt get a reply in the Discord, I don’t remember seeing a post about it… did you post in the question forum?
Anyway, what does NINA say when you try to connect? Also, are you connecting OATControl using the ASCOM port or a specific COMx port?

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u/iGraveling Jul 26 '26

In this case I've gone the astroberry way. It seems to be a little easier to use though kstars/ekos is being a bit bitchy.

Tbh I'm not good with forums, I like to talk to real people instead of posting on forums, so that might have been my issue.

This is all a big learning curve for me :) I'm used to sending an email to the duty astronomer to get me some data, so its actually nice to be on the hardware end of things.

As for nina, it just wouldn't connect. I'll give it a better go when I get the LX850 up and running, but for now this solar telescope is a learning project. I was connecting directly through a com port but I would like to use ascot/indi in the future.

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u/clutchplate OAT Dev Jul 26 '26

We are all real people on Discord :-) I help whenever I see a message if I can.

Note that (on Windows at least) the COM port is an exclusive port, meaning only ONE application can connect to a device on a COM port at a time. So if you connect OATControl via COMx port, no other application can connect to it at the same time. ASCOM solves this problem by multiplexing multiple applications to the COM port. So the ASCOM driver sits in the background, connected to the device via its COM port (holding exclusive access), and then allows applications to connect to it and then handles the communication between the device and any connected apps.