The Dragonfly is an essential piece of equipment for your observatory. It provides a simple means to centralise all power switching and sensing. In addition it can respond to various 'conditions' using user defined scripts and control almost any aspect of your observatory. It is particularly suited to remote installations or where you wish to control your observatory from in your home. The Dragonfly allows you to turn all power on/off and can react to inputs from other devices such as the Lunatico Cloudwatcher or other sensors and react however you demand.
A typical scenario might be that the input from a Cloudwatcher warns it is Unsafe due to bad weather. The Dragonfly sees this and could tell a roof control system like the Talon to close. At the same time it can notify you on your phone and start to instruct your camera to warm up, put the mount in park, close all applications and finally shut down the PC. With some simple additional wiring and using the Dragonfly App, you can also turn on your PC from you phone before logging on to start an imaging session.
Dragonfly now hosts its programming internally meaning it does not rely on an active PC program for control. It can use scripts for total automation but also offers powerful macro control using conditional logic such as If, Then, Or, And logic. In addition it can execute scripts direct to Ascom. This would allow a Dragonfly to control the motor of a roof, and also monitor the position of this and a mount. It can send a mount to park using a script, but using conditional logic, only allow the roof to close once parked.
The Dragonfly is configured for control of 2 wire mains but also features a separate earth connection for use with 3 wire main. We recommend that if switching mains the Dragonfly be housed in a suitable enclosure for safety reasons. Alternatively an optional safety cover (blue terminal cover shown above) is available to prevent accidental contact with terminals carrying mains voltage.
The basics of Dragonfly control are
Switch on and off any equipment up to 240V/10A per input. Max 10A load total
Control 8 relays (4 of them double NO/NC, and 4 NO)
Sense up to 8 Contact Closure Inputs / Analogue Inputs
Monitor the AAG Cloudwatcher and check for safe or unsafe weather conditions
Monitor, using magnet or mechanical sensors the mount's position, the status of the roof etc, etc
Support for the Dragonfly smartphone app
ZeroConfiguration network system (needs no programming of your router)
ASCOM switch interface
Internal web server (including a page to manage the relays and sensors, and javascript for web page integration)
Technical specifications
Internal CPU Atmel AT91SAM7x256
Manages 8 relays (4 of them double NO/NC, and 4 NO), to switch DC or AC
8 input sensors: magnet, contact, etc - overload protected with resettable fuses
Extremely well protected against noise
Direct network connection (ethernet)
Power requirements: 12V (up to 24V is ok), D.C., less than 1A required, standard 5.5 / 2.1mm jack, inner positive.
Size: 135 * 48 * 244 mm. box only (total mounted 157 * 57 * 244 mm.) 3U High if 19" Rack Mounted.
We can provide you all the help you need to implement your Dragonfly from wiring plans to example scripts for automation. We use Dragonfly extensively at our hosting partner, E-Eye in Spain and can therefore advise on real world use.
