Colour co-ordinated grab 'n' go

[MortonH]

Just received my new-to-me AOK Traveler mount (thanks Vaidya!) and had to post these pictures of it with my little SV66ED. :D

Currently I've put the mount on a Manfrotto 055 tripod and they seem to work well together. Of course I haven't actually observed yet but hoping I might get a small gap in the clouds tonight.

I also tried putting my SV80ED and C6 on it. Apart from the tripod being inadequate with the C6 and in danger of tipping over, the mount itself seems to handle them with ease. In fact, the motion is smoother with the two larger scopes. With the 66 I need to use a bit more force to overcome the stiction and start it moving.

It will be interesting to see how smooth the motions are once I'm pointing at an object in the sky. But as PeterHA posted last year (http://www.iceinspace.com.au/forum/showthread.php?t=117219) it seems a camera tripod will be sufficient for an 80-90mm refractor for an extremely compact travel setup. Peter's previous post was the reason I jumped on this when it came up. :thanx:

I will post an update when I use it on the sky. For now I'm having fun just staring at it in the living room.

[LewisM]

Just lovely!

[Allan]

Hey Morton, that all red setup looks very cool. I'm sure the view will be just as good. Any plans to travel with it, it looks ideal for that?

[MortonH]

No travel plans at the moment but it will certainly work well for that.

Just tried it out on the sky. Very solid, even with the 80ED on the camera tripod. I just need to adjust the friction so it works better with the small refractors. At the moment it's set for a bigger scope.

[Camelopardalis]

Looks sharp Morton :thumbsup:

[MortonH]

Managed a brief look through a gap in the clouds last night. With the tension set to minimum it is much smoother and works well with the SV66. Not as smooth as my DSV-3 but they're hardly in the same class!

I think the most exciting thing for me is that it handles the 80ED on my camera tripod, which really does make it a compact and lightweight setup. The 80ED will get more use now.

[FlashDrive]

Looks the part alright .... quite nice to :thumbsup:

Red's in, everything else is ' out ' .... apparently :P

Col...

[MortonH]

Thanks, Col.

Made some further refinements to the tension settings tonight and now have it set up nicely for my small refractors. Just spent 45 minutes cruising the Milky Way plus some quick looks at Saturn and Luna before the clouds rolled in again.