Nothing but problems!

Randy,
So it looks like a couple of things are going on here.

1. Failure to start - It appears that SGP is slewing and getting on target just fine but when PHD starts we're timing out. We will only wait 5 minutes for PHD to get up and calibrated and this is likely what is taking too long. Initially I'd recommend you NOT do this. There are some ways to mitigate this timeout (having PHD save and reuse the calibration data, starting in a "calibrated" state, etc), however automation is best taken in small bites so I would leave off this portion unless you can't be at the scope for the start. Here is how I recommend you startup the sequence:
   • Right click on the target in SGP and have SGP slew or auto center on that location (don't do this as part of the running sequence. (ie for the first target of the night deselect "Slew To" or "Center on"
   • Once centered to your liking fire up PHD
   • Manually start the calibration process in PHD and wait for it to finish guiding
   • In SGP validate your framing is still good, Slew to or Auto Center to adjust (PHD will automatically get paused)
   • Run auto focus or focus with a Bahtinov Mask to establish good initial focus
   • Finally --> Run Sequence

2. Auto Focus Issues

   • It appears that you're not using any backlash compensation for the majority of your runs and if you're focusing by moving the primary mirror this is a must, honestly the amount of backlash compensation doesn't matter much past the "right amount". So if you need 100 steps and you put in 200, 300, 400...etc steps that will work just fine. But if you put in 50 steps that won't be adequate. I would leave it around 400 like you had it for one run, that was actually the only run where I saw any backlash compensation. You can generally feel this out to a certain degree.
     1. Start by disabling backlash compensation.
     2. Manually focus, making sure to finish focus against gravity, take note of the position
     3. Move with gravity 100 steps
     4. Move against gravity 100 steps
     5. Are you in focus? If so then the amount of steps in 3 & 4 is adequate. If not increase them and start at 2. \

Once you have backlash in the ballpark then you can work on getting your step size figured out for AF. But you HAVE to get backlash figured out first, otherwise you'll just be chasing focus around. Using a Crayford focuser on the back of an SCT definitely helps to simplify backlash and mirror flop issues, and if you have mirror locks then you don't have to worry about mirror flop either.

Hope that helps!
Jared