Hi Joe,

In between my turning off the tracking, I was using the MOVE SCOPE section’s direction keys - rather than
attaching my Hand Pad - to adjust my camera pointing at my chosen “land target”. Then, when I wanted to move it
back to its original target starting point AZ/ALT coordinates, the GOTO beside the AZ/ALT box, made the CP4 jump
back into Sidereal tracking mode.
Trying to get the mount to stand still for that session, became a cat & mouse game between that GOTO and the
TOGGLE TRACKING button.

Unfortunately, I can't seem to recreate this behavior using APCC Pro v1.8.8.3 and firmware VCP4-P01-13.

Here is what I did:

1) Unparked and turned off mount tracking.
2) To save the mount's current Alt/Az position, I clicked "Load Mount Alt/Az" on APCC's GoTo/Recal tab.
3) In APCC's "Move Scope" control box, I moved the mount around a bit with the Move buttons. Tracking does not become enabled.
4) Back on the GoTo/ReCal tab, I clicked "Goto" in the Alt/az control box. Again, after the Alt/Az slew finished, tracking does not become enabled.

So, please try these steps after you have updated to the latest version of firmware and APCC software. If there is still a problem, send me a link to your logs, and we will take a look.

Best regards,

-Ray Gralak
Author of PEMPro
Author of APCC (Astro-Physics Command Center): https://www.astro-physics.com/apcc-pro
Author of Astro-Physics V2 ASCOM Driver: https://www.siriusimaging.com/apdriver

-----Original Message-----
From: main@ap-gto.groups.io [mailto:main@ap-gto.groups.io] On Behalf Of Joe Zeglinski
Sent: Sunday, November 22, 2020 9:54 PM
To: main@ap-gto.groups.io
Subject: Re: [ap-gto] How to keep APCC Tracking OFF ?

Ray, sorry about my not being clear.

What I meant to say is that after I managed to kill the tracking by rapidly going to the “Toggle Tracking” button, it
would eventually toggle itself back on, for some reason, EVERY time I clicked the GOTO button, beside my saved
AZ/ALT coordinates, in the GoTo/ReCal tab. That happened, even while the mount was NOT tracking at the time. I
wasn’t aware that all GOTO’s automatically re-activate tracking.

That is not to say that I don’t appreciate such a shortcut. I almost never operate the mount in “non-astronomical
mode”, so triggering tracking lest I should forget to activate it myself, is a nice thing. I will just have to remember your
earlier posted instructions on disabling this feature, on those rare circumstances when I need the mount to act like a
theodolite.

In between my turning off the tracking, I was using the MOVE SCOPE section’s direction keys - rather than
attaching my Hand Pad - to adjust my camera pointing at my chosen “land target”. Then, when I wanted to move it
back to its original target starting point AZ/ALT coordinates, the GOTO beside the AZ/ALT box, made the CP4 jump
back into Sidereal tracking mode.
Trying to get the mount to stand still for that session, became a cat & mouse game between that GOTO and the
TOGGLE TRACKING button.

Meanwhile ....
Yes, I do need to update my APCC PRO software, as well as the CP4 on my AP-1200.
I noticed an APCC box saying I needed to Update my “Firmware”. Thinking it wasn’t urgent, I was putting that off a
bit, until the new firmware and manual, which everybody had been talking about, had finally been officially released.
I wasn’t certain whether that major Firmware update was for everybody’s CP4 & CP5, or was just meant for the CP5
and the Mach-2 mount.
I’ll get on that task this week.

Joe Z.



From: Ray Gralak
Sent: Sunday, November 22, 2020 5:52 PM
To: main@ap-gto.groups.io
Subject: Re: [ap-gto] How to keep APCC Tracking OFF ?

Hi Joe,

similar to the (sometimes undesirable) automatic Tracking hassle on APCC start up,

APCC gives you full control of the tracking behavior on startup. I just posted three options to choose from.

However, if I adjusted the target, and needed to go back to the saved RA/AZ coordinates,
that GOTO button

If I understand what you are saying, then using any of the mount's move buttons will turn tracking on. That's because
to stop a move command when you release a button, the mount must send a "Q" command, which enables tracking.
That is the way the firmware works and is not something specific to APCC.

-Ray Gralak
Author of PEMPro
Author of APCC (Astro-Physics Command Center): https://www.astro-physics.com/apcc-pro
Author of Astro-Physics V2 ASCOM Driver: https://www.siriusimaging.com/apdriver

-----Original Message-----
From: main@ap-gto.groups.io [mailto:main@ap-gto.groups.io] On Behalf Of Joe Zeglinski
Sent: Sunday, November 22, 2020 2:11 PM
To: ap-gto.groups.io
Subject: [ap-gto] How to keep APCC Tracking OFF ?

Hi,
similar to the (sometimes undesirable) automatic Tracking hassle on APCC start up, I dislike the fact that ANY
GOTO command automatically turns Sidereal Tracking back on.

Recently, I was doing some camera check out, focussing on a distant condo construction crane. Once, after
clicking the TOGGLE Tracking button (off) I got the target in my scope sites, painstakingly using the direction slew
buttons. However, if I adjusted the target, and needed to go back to the saved RA/AZ coordinates, that GOTO button
in that tab, suddenly turned Sidereal Tracking back on. It was a constant battle to do a “saved” ALT/AZ GOTO, and
quickly toggle the Tracking, before the mount drifted away from my set target.
Uncomplimentary words were said to APCC !!!

Am I missing something? Is there a setting to keep the tracking off? I tried to set the tracking to NONE, but the

next

GOTO still flipped it back on again.
There are other times where I would like Tracking not to interfere – one time I was trying to construct an APCC
Horizon Limits plot. There may be other circumstances, where I want total manual control of the mount, via the

APCC

rather than a Hand Pad.

How do I kill all APCC Tracking, until I specifically re-enable that feature?

Joe Z.