Putting lens on a dovetail

[sejanus]

hey

not sure if I'm missing something obvious here

as previously mentioned I want to bolt my biggish 200mm lens onto a GEM.

The lens is too heavy to piggyback off the back of a 80ED

I rang a couple of stores and they could only suggest mounting it on rings which i don't like the idea of with a expensive lens.

Is there a way/adapter/whatever to mount the tripod leg of the lens (standard screw size for cameras, the exact same screw hole that is on the base of most slr's) _directly_ to the eq6 dovetail or dovetail plate?

hope i have my terminology right

[RB]

Yes there is Gav, I did it recently with the Canon 24-70mm f/2.8 to take this Orion widefield shot. (http://www.iceinspace.com.au/forum/showthread.php?t=24670)

I first polar aligned using the scope, then took it off and bolted a Losmandy bar to the EM200.
Then I used another bolt to attach a Manfrotto Ball Head to it so I could attach the camera.

[sejanus]

where did u buy the bits?

[RB]

You can get the Losmandy dovetail plate from Bintel and the bolts from Bunnings.