Strain Wave Mount Guiding: The PHD2 Settings That Finally Worked for Me

Struggling to get good guiding from a strain wave (harmonic drive) mount? In this video I share what I've learned about PHD2 guiding after moving from traditional German equatorial mounts to a strain wave mount — including the settings that helped me improve my guiding from around 1–2+ pixels to approximately 0.5 pixels. Strain wave mounts are incredibly portable, powerful and increasingly popular for astrophotography, but guiding them can be quite different from guiding a traditional EQ mount. In this episode of Adventures in Astronomy, I look at: • Why strain wave mounts behave differently from traditional EQ mounts • Periodic error and why it can be more complicated with harmonic drives • Why shorter guide exposures can work better • PHD2 min-move settings • Using PPEC with a strain wave mount • Multi-star guiding • Why polar alignment can be more important • How payload position and seeing can affect guiding performance • The PHD2 settings I've been experimenting with on my own setup 00:00 - Intro 01:24 - The problem 01:55 - How do harmonic dirve mounts work? 03:15 - How EQ mounts work 03:39 - Periodic Error 05:15 - Guide under 1 second exposures 06:04 - Min/Mo settings matter 06:23 - Choose the right algorithm 07:32 - Multi Star Guiding 07:43 - Polar Alignment 08:13 - Ending Thanks for watching Adventures in Astronomy. Clear skies! Martin