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  #21  
Old 17-11-2019, 08:47 PM
Imme (Jon)
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Location: Kyneton
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Saturday morning and my mount is in pieces of the kitchen table waiting for the final two new bearings to turn up. What to do....

So I thought it must be time to sort out the nightmare wiring setup I had going on. 3 dew heaters, focuser, coupe cameras plus all the USB wiring to go with them (and some redundant wires I can’t even remember what they were used for!)

Everything was stripped off, reassembled, re-bunched and finally rerouted. Now I have a nice plug in system (power adapter type plugs) and I’ve housed all my power supplies in a nice weather proof box.

....also put labels on all my wiring.

......and I also moved my pier 100mm further away from my observatory wall. When I put the pier in a couple years back I had a different scope and clearance wasn’t an issue. The fly 132 with camera gear hanging off the back is a little longer though and clearance was tight.

....hope these bearings get here tomorrow because I’ve run out of things to do!
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  #22  
Old 19-11-2019, 09:58 AM
Imme (Jon)
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Final bearings turned up yesterday so mount was put back together. Setting up the RA block was fairly simple although i must admit a little strange and I wasn't sure if I'd done it correctly (still not actually as there isn't a great deal of info on the net regarding this thing!). Following the very comprehensive and clear instruction booklet i took out the backlash....meaning there was no side to side movement on the RA axis (think worm gear mesh rocking back and forth between drive ring gear teeth). I then tightened an extra half turn. I still had movement back and forth and this stumped me for a while....the gears were meshed, it wasn't a normal noticeable 'click, click' between gears meshing, it was more of a smooth 'tensioned' movement either side of an obvious centre point. It wasn't until halfway through my second beer I came to the conclusion this was the spring doing it's thing and taking up backlash (well I hope that's what it is!). The one thing I will note with this thing which is a little disappointing.....the worm mesh adjustment grub screws are the same size as the original mount. I feel they could have gone at least one size up as the adjustment process with a spring included in the mix (meaning additional pressure) seemed to push them to the limit a little.
DEC axis gear was also adjusted and came up pretty good I think.

Mount was put back in the Ob's doing a polar alignment with Sharpcap (gotta love it). PA error ended up at 0.24"....that'll do me!

Seeing last night I think wasn't the best so probably not a great night to test the new rig. SkippySky gave me a 6-7 on their scale for my location. I had high smoke from a burnoff to contend with, however, initial testing seems pretty positive. Guiding hovered around 1"rms which is fine for what I need.
I'm pretty sure once I spend a night tweaking the PHD settings and doing some final mesh adjustments once the mount settles in I'll be able to improve on that. No real backlash on the RA axis from what I could see during the quick test session I had before bed. I'm looking forward to doing some more rigorous testing on it when I can

All in all I'm pretty happy so far.......give me a few weeks to play and fine tune and I think I'll be more than happy with how it pans out.

Oh.....and the noise reduction from the belt mod...outstanding!

Last edited by Imme; 19-11-2019 at 10:15 AM.
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  #23  
Old 19-11-2019, 10:36 AM
morls (Stephen)
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Hi Jon,
The focus drive looks interesting - is this something you've built?
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  #24  
Old 19-11-2019, 10:42 AM
Imme (Jon)
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Quote:
Originally Posted by morls View Post
Hi Jon,
The focus drive looks interesting - is this something you've built?
No, not that smart!

That's the off the shelf ZWO EAF.....great bit of kit if you ask me
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  #25  
Old 19-11-2019, 10:54 AM
morls (Stephen)
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Ah, ok.

Thanks, have to check it out
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  #26  
Old 29-04-2020, 02:39 PM
speedyjim (James)
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Location: Brisbane
Posts: 10
I have this kit too and yes its odd as the RA axis has like a spongey play in it when wobbling by hand rather than the typical rocking/clicking play from the worm you would get. Did my head in but it is definitely the kinetic worm doing its thing and nothing to worry about.

Quote:
Originally Posted by Imme View Post
Final bearings turned up yesterday so mount was put back together. Setting up the RA block was fairly simple although i must admit a little strange and I wasn't sure if I'd done it correctly (still not actually as there isn't a great deal of info on the net regarding this thing!). Following the very comprehensive and clear instruction booklet i took out the backlash....meaning there was no side to side movement on the RA axis (think worm gear mesh rocking back and forth between drive ring gear teeth). I then tightened an extra half turn. I still had movement back and forth and this stumped me for a while....the gears were meshed, it wasn't a normal noticeable 'click, click' between gears meshing, it was more of a smooth 'tensioned' movement either side of an obvious centre point. It wasn't until halfway through my second beer I came to the conclusion this was the spring doing it's thing and taking up backlash (well I hope that's what it is!). The one thing I will note with this thing which is a little disappointing.....the worm mesh adjustment grub screws are the same size as the original mount. I feel they could have gone at least one size up as the adjustment process with a spring included in the mix (meaning additional pressure) seemed to push them to the limit a little.
DEC axis gear was also adjusted and came up pretty good I think.

Mount was put back in the Ob's doing a polar alignment with Sharpcap (gotta love it). PA error ended up at 0.24"....that'll do me!

Seeing last night I think wasn't the best so probably not a great night to test the new rig. SkippySky gave me a 6-7 on their scale for my location. I had high smoke from a burnoff to contend with, however, initial testing seems pretty positive. Guiding hovered around 1"rms which is fine for what I need.
I'm pretty sure once I spend a night tweaking the PHD settings and doing some final mesh adjustments once the mount settles in I'll be able to improve on that. No real backlash on the RA axis from what I could see during the quick test session I had before bed. I'm looking forward to doing some more rigorous testing on it when I can

All in all I'm pretty happy so far.......give me a few weeks to play and fine tune and I think I'll be more than happy with how it pans out.

Oh.....and the noise reduction from the belt mod...outstanding!
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  #27  
Old 11-05-2020, 07:02 AM
weathermon (Mike)
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Join Date: Jun 2014
Location: Mackay, Australia
Posts: 74
Hi guys I have the NEQ6 Pro with the belt mod + hypertune (mount is 7 years old now). I'm also looking at getting the zero backlash worm block, do you think it's a worth while upgrade? I'm carrying a 10" F5 reflector. My RMS is around 0.8 total which is still pretty good but I want to get as much as I can from it.

Cheers, Mike
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  #28  
Old 04-07-2020, 08:02 PM
speedyjim (James)
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Location: Brisbane
Posts: 10
These upgrades can create more issues and frustration dialing them in. If your already at 0.8 I would say just leave it as is. When its not guiding well in the future then consider it I guess as its a fair amount of $$$

Quote:
Originally Posted by weathermon View Post
Hi guys I have the NEQ6 Pro with the belt mod + hypertune (mount is 7 years old now). I'm also looking at getting the zero backlash worm block, do you think it's a worth while upgrade? I'm carrying a 10" F5 reflector. My RMS is around 0.8 total which is still pretty good but I want to get as much as I can from it.

Cheers, Mike
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