I have again a problem with my SkyBt. Until recently the SkyBt device used to work fine. Until a couple of days ago I got the same message as with the old unit: SkyBt "Sky Safari can make a wireless connection to scope but scope isn't responding." This is very frustrating. I haven`t changed anything. Neither on the scope setup nor on my Android device. It looks like the SkyBt unit is defective again.
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17 comments
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Bill Tschumy It seems very unlikely that the second SkyBT would become defective. We have had very few defective units out of the thousands we've sold.
Are you seeing a change in the pattern of flashing lights when you try to connect? That will indicate you are talking to the correct SkyBT unit.
How are you powering the SkyBT? Are you using external power? If so, do you have rechargeable batteries in the unit?
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Thor I use external power but also tried AAA batteries as well as rechargeable batteries. When I try to connect the yellow light flashes two or three times and then the fault message appears.
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Bill Tschumy As specified in the Quick Start Guide, only used rechargeables when using external power. The external power is part of the recharging circuit and using regular batteries can damage the unit (although I don't think that is your problem). I'm going to convert this thread to a support ticket and we can take over there.
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Thor I only used rechargeable as well as regular batteries once to make sure the propblem was not caused by the external power. When batteries were fitted, no external power was connected.
As mentioned before it all worked fine until suddenly the problem occured. I did not change the setup, no software update to the scope, no different cable, nothing was changed.
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Bill Tschumy If it is indeed another SkyBT failure, I would assume there must be something unusual about your setup that is causing the unit to fail. Do you have any friends that you could try the unit with, connecting to their scope with their (or your) phone?
The only other thing I can recommend is to send it back to us for analysis.
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Thor Unfortunately there aren`t any other scopes around here. I think sending the unit back to you for analysis is the best option. I tried everything I could possibly think of including different cables as well as changing the adaptor.
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Thor Can you please let me know the adress where I have to send the unit?
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Bill Tschumy Please send me a private email and I'll let you know the details. "bill at simcur dot com"
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Terry Barker I'm having this same problem with Sky Safari and a Celestron SLT 102 refractor. Used to work most of the time, but now not at all, and I'm getting this same message.
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Bill Tschumy Thor sent me his device and it was working properly for me. I sent it back to him and it was working for him again. It is not clear what the problem was, but it wasn't a hardware failure.
Terry,
Try power cycling the SkyBT while it is plugged into the scope (and the scope is powered on). Then try connecting.
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Terry Barker I have done that numerous times--would sometimes work for me in the past, but not now. I've had my scope out at least 8-10 times since it last worked.
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Terry Barker Should I send mine back, too, or do you have another way for me to try to revive mine?
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Bill Tschumy Terry,
When you try to connect are you seeing a change in the blinking lights on the SkyBT? If not then your Android device is not finding the correct Bluetooth device. If you have more than one serial bluetooth device, then SkySafari might be trying to connect to the wrong one. You might try tapping the "Connect Via Bluetooth" option in SkySafari when it is already selected. This should bring up a picker that will let you explicitly choose you SkyBT. The SkyBT broadcasts a name like "FireFlyBP-XXXX". See if explicitly choosing the bluetooth device solves the problem.
If you really want to send it to me, send me an email at bill@simcur.com and I'll give you an address.
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Terry Barker Ok, progress. I can see Firefly on my phone, but not when I try it through Sky Safari--when I turn on Bluetooth on my phone, I see Firefly as paired. Then I go to Sky Safari, Settings, and click on Bluetooth, like you said--no devices at all. Tried it multiple times. It seems like I remember seeing other software than can connect to SkyBT, so maybe there's something else I can try? I'm starting to suspect my version of Sky Safari--it's pretty old.
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Bill Tschumy So you get the Picker view shown (entitled "Choose Bluetooth Device"), but the list is empty? I've never seen that. I always have 10 or so devices in the list because it finds all kinds of bluetooth device in my vicinity.
I kind of doubt the SkySafari version is the problem. If you see the picker then it must be reasonably recent (say in the last 4 years).
What Android device do you have and what version of Android?
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Terry Barker It's definitely the phone, even though it's fairly new. My tablet connects and controls the phone just fine--never thought to try it before. The phone is an LG V20, Android version 7.0. Thanks for the help--I'll just use my tablet from now on--it's a 7 inch, so it's easy to carry.
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Bill Tschumy OK, glad you have a solution that works. I missed that it was only failing on one device. This means it is not the SkyBT at fault.
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