Unihedron SQM-LE User manual

SQM-LE Operator’s Manual
©Copyright 2005 - 2022
Version: 20220822
Company information
Mailing address Unihedron
4 Lawrence Avenue
Grimsby, Ontario L3M 2L9
Canada
Telephone [phone]
Website unihedron.com

Contents
List of Figures ........................................................ 5
List of Tables ......................................................... 7
1 Introduction ....................................................... 9
1.1 QuickStart ..................................................... 9
1.1.1 Settinguptheinstrument......................................... 9
1.1.2 Othersoftware ............................................... 9
1.1.3 FITSintegration .............................................. 9
2 Measurements ...................................................... 11
2.1 Gettingaccuratereadings ............................................. 12
2.1.1 Seeingconditions.............................................. 12
2.1.2 Lightpollution ............................................... 12
2.1.3 Otherluminancescales .......................................... 13
3 Theory of operation ................................................... 15
3.1 Lightmeasurement................................................. 15
3.2 CommunicationtothePC............................................. 16
4 Specifications ....................................................... 17
5 Hardware connections .................................................. 18
5.1 Hardwareconnections ............................................... 18
5.1.1 Hub/Switchconnection .......................................... 18
5.1.2 Wireless connection (wireless client bridge) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 19
5.1.3 MorethanoneSQM-LE.......................................... 20
5.1.4 Directconnection.............................................. 20
5.1.5 PoweroverEthernet(PoE) ........................................ 21
5.1.6 Lockswitch................................................. 22
6 Software development .................................................. 23
6.1 Writing your own software interface . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 23
6.2 Pascal ........................................................ 24
6.3 Customwebpage.................................................. 24
7 Unihedron Device Manager .............................................. 25
7.1 GettingUDM.................................................... 25
7.2 Installation ..................................................... 25
7.2.1 Systemrequirements............................................ 25
7.2.2 Windows .................................................. 25
7.2.3 Mac ..................................................... 25
7.2.4 Linux .................................................... 25
7.3 Operation...................................................... 26
7.3.1 Startup................................................... 26
3

Contents
7.3.2 Mainscreen................................................. 26
7.3.3 Mainmenu ................................................. 27
7.3.4 Filemenu.................................................. 27
7.3.5 Viewmenu ................................................. 28
7.3.6 Toolsmenu ................................................. 34
7.3.7 Helpmenu ................................................. 42
7.4 Informationtab................................................... 43
7.5 LogContinuous................................................... 44
7.5.1 Import.datintospreadsheet........................................ 51
7.6 Calibrationtab................................................... 52
7.7 ReportIntervaltab................................................. 53
7.7.1 Continuousreports............................................. 53
7.8 Firmwaretab .................................................... 53
7.8.1 XPortdefaults ............................................... 55
7.9 Configurationtab.................................................. 55
7.9.1 Sensorarrangement ............................................ 56
7.9.2 Lockswitchsettings ............................................ 56
7.9.3 Vectordatalogger.............................................. 56
7.9.4 Contourplot ................................................ 57
7.9.5 Minimum.datrequirements........................................ 58
7.10Simulationtab ................................................... 58
7.10.1 Simulationfromfile ............................................ 59
7.11Accessoryoptions.................................................. 60
7.11.1 Humidityaccessory............................................. 60
7.11.2 Displayaccessory.............................................. 60
7.11.3 LEDaccessory ............................................... 60
7.11.4 Relayaccessory............................................... 60
7.12Commandlineparameters............................................. 61
7.12.1 Internalstartupoptions .......................................... 62
7.12.2 Windowsautostartup ........................................... 62
7.12.3 Macautostartup .............................................. 62
8 Commands and responses ............................................... 63
8.1 Commands ..................................................... 63
8.2 Responsedetails .................................................. 64
8.2.1 Readingrequest .............................................. 64
8.2.2 Unaveragedreadingrequest........................................ 64
8.2.3 Linearreadingrequest........................................... 65
8.2.4 Inlinelinearreadingrequest........................................ 66
8.2.5 Unitinformation .............................................. 67
8.3 Calibrationcommands............................................... 68
8.3.1 Calibration information request . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 68
8.3.2 Lightcalibrationcommand ........................................ 68
8.3.3 Darkcalibrationcommand ........................................ 69
8.3.4 Disarmcalibrationcommand ....................................... 69
8.3.5 Manually set light calibration offset . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 70
8.3.6 Manually set light calibration temperature . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 70
8.3.7 Manually set dark calibration time period . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 71
8.3.8 Manually set dark calibration temperature . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 71
8.4 Locksettings .................................................... 73
8.5 SnowLEDaccessory................................................ 73
8.6 Accessoriescommands............................................... 75
8.6.1 Humidity / Temperture sensor . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 75
8.6.2 Displayaccessory.............................................. 76
4Unihedron SQM-LE Operator’s Manual - 20220822

8.6.3 LEDaccessory ............................................... 77
8.6.4 Relayaccessory............................................... 78
8.7 Continuousreportingcommands ......................................... 79
8.8 Setting Interval reporting parameters . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 81
8.8.1 Firewall settings at the listener side . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 82
8.8.2 XPort settings for interval reporting mode . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 82
8.8.3 Interval reporting period setting . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 83
8.8.4 Threshold setting for interval reporting . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 83
8.8.5 Intervalsettingresponse.......................................... 83
8.9 Simulationcommands ............................................... 84
9 Installation ........................................................ 86
9.1 Electricalconnection................................................ 86
9.2 Mechanicalinstallation............................................... 86
9.2.1 Coverselection ............................................... 86
9.2.2 Covercalibration.............................................. 86
9.2.3 Covermaintenance............................................. 87
10 Default settings ..................................................... 88
10.1XPortsettings ................................................... 88
10.2ARPmethod .................................................... 88
10.2.1 ForLinux.................................................. 89
11 Firmware upgrade .................................................... 90
11.1Details........................................................ 90
12 Calibration ........................................................ 91
12.1Recalibration .................................................... 91
12.2Lightcalibration .................................................. 91
12.3Darkcalibration .................................................. 91
12.4Confirmation .................................................... 91
13 Troubleshooting ..................................................... 92
14 Glossary .......................................................... 96
15 Bibliography ....................................................... 97
List of Figures
2.1 Mpsasinterpretivescale .............................................. 11
2.2 MpsasvsNELM .................................................. 14
3.1 SQM-LEBlockdiagram .............................................. 15
5.1 Connectiondiagram ................................................ 18
5.2 Hub/switchconnection............................................... 19
5.3 Wirelessclientbridgeconnection ......................................... 19
5.4 Portforwardingexample.............................................. 20
5

List of Figures
5.5 Direct connection with crossover cable . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 21
5.6 PoEwiringexample ................................................ 22
5.7 Locksetting..................................................... 22
7.1 Splashscreen .................................................... 26
7.2 Filemenu ...................................................... 27
7.3 FileOpendialog .................................................. 28
7.4 Viewmenu ..................................................... 28
7.5 View:Log ..................................................... 29
7.6 View:Directories .................................................. 29
7.7 Dataloggingheader ................................................ 30
7.8 SetLocationdialog................................................. 31
7.9 Plotterwindow ................................................... 32
7.10Tool:oldlogtodat ................................................ 34
7.11Tool:dattoMooncsv .............................................. 34
7.12Tool:Commterminal............................................... 35
7.13Tool:.datto.kml ................................................. 35
7.14 Tool : .dat to .kml GoogleEarth result . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 36
7.15Tool:.dattimecorrection............................................. 36
7.16 Tool : .dat local time reconstruction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 37
7.17RSEalgorithm ................................................... 40
7.18Helpmenu...................................................... 42
7.19Help:About .................................................... 42
7.20Founddevice(single)................................................ 42
7.21Founddevice(multiple) .............................................. 43
7.22USBconnectiondetails............................................... 43
7.23Ethernetconnectiondetails ............................................ 43
7.24RS232connectiondetails.............................................. 43
7.25Informationtab................................................... 44
7.26LogContinuouslyscreen.............................................. 44
7.27LogContinuouslyTriggertab........................................... 45
7.28LogContinuouslyLooktab ............................................ 45
7.29LogContinuouslyStatustab ........................................... 45
7.30LogContinuouslyThreshold............................................ 46
7.31LogContinuouslyalerts .............................................. 46
7.32 Log Continuously Alarm for darkness . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 47
7.33LogContinuouslyTransfertab .......................................... 47
7.34LogContinuouslyAnnotationtab......................................... 48
7.35LogContinuouslyGPStab ............................................ 49
7.36Calibrationtab(initial) .............................................. 52
7.37Calibrationtab(populated)............................................ 52
7.38Reportintervaltab................................................. 53
7.39Firmwaretab .................................................... 54
7.40Firmwareselection ................................................. 54
7.41Configurationtab.................................................. 55
7.42Lightcalibrationconfirmation........................................... 55
7.43Darkcalibrationconfirmation........................................... 56
7.44Sensorarrangement ................................................ 56
7.45Lockswitchsettings ................................................ 56
7.46Dataloggingpageforvectormodel ........................................ 57
7.47Contourplotof336readings ........................................... 58
7.48Fig:Simulationtab ................................................. 59
7.49Accessoriestab ................................................... 60
6Unihedron SQM-LE Operator’s Manual - 20220822

9.1 Housing ....................................................... 86
9.2 Examplecovercalibration............................................. 87
List of Tables
2.1 Apparent Magnitudes of Known Celestial Objects adapted from [2] . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 11
7.2 .dat to Sun-Moon-MW-Clouds values . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 38
7.3 simin.csvfielddescription ............................................. 59
7.4 Log continuous command line parameters . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 61
7.5 Select device command line parameters . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 61
7.6 Select features command line parameters . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 61
8.1 Summaryofstandardcommands ......................................... 63
8.2 Readingrequestresponse ............................................. 64
8.3 Unaveraged reading request response . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 65
8.4 Linearreadingrequestresponse.......................................... 65
8.5 Inline linear reading request response . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 66
8.6 Unitinformationrequestresponse ........................................ 67
8.7 Calibration information request response . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 68
8.8 Lightcalibrationresponse ............................................. 68
8.9 Darkcalibrationresponse ............................................. 69
8.10Disarmcalibrationresponse............................................ 70
8.11 Response for manual setting of light calibration offset . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 70
8.12 Response for manually setting of light calibration temperature . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 71
8.13 Response of manually setting dark calibration time period . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 71
8.14 Response for manually setting of dark calibration temperature . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 72
8.15Locksettingcommandsummary ......................................... 73
8.16Locksettingresponsesummary.......................................... 73
8.17LEDaccessorycommandsummary........................................ 74
8.18LEDaccessoryresponsesummary......................................... 74
8.19 Humidity/temperature command summary . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 75
8.20 Humidity/temperature response summary . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 75
8.21 Display accessory command summary . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 76
8.22 Display accessory response summary . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 76
8.23LEDaccessorycommandsummary........................................ 77
8.24LEDaccessoryresponsesummary......................................... 77
8.25Relayaccessorycommandsummary ....................................... 78
8.26Relayaccessoryresponsesummary ........................................ 78
8.27Summaryofstandardcommands ......................................... 79
8.28 Continuous reporting command summary . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 79
8.29 Response of all continuous reporting requests . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 79
8.30Intervalreport ................................................... 81
8.31 XPort settings for interval reporting mode . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 82
8.32 Response of viewing or setting interval reporting parameters . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 83
8.33 Response of request for internal simulation values . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 84
8.34Requestsimulation(S....x)............................................. 84
7

8.35 Response of setting simulation values (S...x) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 85
10.1DefaultXPortsettings............................................... 88
13.1Readingseemtoobright.............................................. 92
13.2Readingis0.00mpsas................................................ 92
13.3CannotFindUDMsoftware............................................ 92
13.4Meterseemstoohot ................................................ 92
13.5Readingsdonotgetdarkenough......................................... 93
13.6 Error 404 when trying to reconfigure Ethernet module . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 93
13.7Meterwillnotrespond............................................... 93
13.8Socketerror10051 ................................................. 94
13.9Pingbutnoreadings................................................ 94
13.10PingbutcannotbefoundbyUDM........................................ 94
13.11Lantronix Device Installer update problems . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 94
13.12Readingerrorsreported .............................................. 95
13.13Darkroom-bagreadingsincorrect ......................................... 95
14.1Glossaryofterms.................................................. 96
List of Equations
2.1 MPSAS to cd/m2.................................................. 13
2.2 NELMtoMPSAS ................................................. 14
2.3 MPSAStoNELM ................................................. 14
8.1 RawTemperaturetodegC............................................. 84
8.2 degCtoRawTemperature............................................. 84
8

1 Introduction
Thank you for purchasing the SQM-LE. You will soon be on your way to collecting scientific data.
The SQM series of products have been used in the following applications:
•Quantitatively comparing the sky brightness at different astronomical observing sites.
•Documenting the evolution of light pollution.
•Setting planetarium dome illumination to mimic the skies that people are likely to experience elsewhere in the city.
•Monitoring sky brightness through the night, night-to-night, and year-to-year for astronomical observation records.
•Determining which nights show the greatest promise for finding the ’faintest fuzzies’.
•Calibrating the effect of sky brightness on qualitative measures such as the Bortle Scale or NELM.
•Investigating how sky brightness correlates with the solar cycle and month-to-month sunspot activity.
•Helping to provide local ground truth for future sky brightness prediction with the Clear Sky Clock.
•Helping CCD users make a correlation between the SQM reading and when the background reaches some ADC
level.
•Assisting Sea Turtle researchers in studying the amounts of light in areas where turtle hatchlings are affected by
artificial lights.
•Researching bird-song synchronization with dawn.
•Researching twilight brightness changes with the addition of external Neutral Density filters. Unihedron offers
adapters to attach such filters onto the meter.
1.1 QuickStart
1.1.1 Setting up the instrument
1. Either connect the SQM-LE meter to your network router with the supplied blue straight-through Ethernet cable,
or directly to your computer with the supplied red crossover cable.
2. Connect to power supply to the SQM-LE and the AC supply.
3. Launch UDM (Unihedron Device Manager software).
4. Click the “Find” button to find attached devices, then click on the SQM-LE that you connected.
5. Click on “Reading” to get a reading from the SQM-LE.
1.1.2 Other software
•If you are using Windows, you may want to use Knightware SQM-Reader from www.knightware.biz/sqm .
•The CD contains examples of software (Perl, Python, etc.) for various functions that connect to the meter.
1.1.3 FITS integration
Some programs (listed below) gather information from the Unihedron Sky Quality meter products and insert that data
into the Flexible Image Transport System (FITS) header.
•MaxPilote (Freeware) incorporates SQM readings from an SQM-LE/SQM-LU into the FITS header while at the
same time provide constant readings in a live and updated Data Window.
9

1 Introduction
•CCDAutoPilot
•FITS4Win2 uses the MPSAS keyword for sorting and filtering image files.
10 Unihedron SQM-LE Operator’s Manual - 20220822