Looking for a new mount. Need advice.

[RugbyRene (Rene)]

Hi all,

Well it finally happened. My pain in the ar*e SW AZEQ6GT mount finally died. I will be holding a funeral ceremony while gleefully dancing around it’s burning ashes. You can probably tell from that last sentence that I did not like this mount. It was a constant battle to control the rampant periodic error and huge random, inexplicable spikes in the guide graph.

Anyway, I’m now in the market for a new mount (even Sky Watcher). While I’m happy to spend the money I’m not going to go crazy (so no Planewave mounts). I’m open to any and all suggestions. It will be carrying about 15kg of gear and must have good guiding performance and low periodic error. Portability is not really an issue as I mainly image from my front yard.

I’d be very interested to hear from people who have the following mounts but am open to others.

Avalon (Linear or M-UNO)
SW EQ8RH
Rainbow Astro

Cheers in advance

Rene

[Startrek (Martin)]

I have 2 EQ6-R mounts ( 2018 and 2019 USB model)
One carries 15kg , the other carries 10kg in different locations
I’ve fine tuned both with adjusting worm and belts etc...
Very smooth tracking and guiding
Best figures using PHD2 , 0.55 Dec and 0.65 Ra carrying 15kg
Although I wouldn’t load too much more on these to achieve tight guiding
For the “price” you really can’t beat these mounts and their performance
My 2 cents.....

[RugbyRene (Rene)]

Yeah I'm not a fan of spending $2500 to then have to tinker with it to get it working properly.

[Startrek (Martin)]

Originally Posted by RugbyRene

Yeah I'm not a fan of spending $2500 to then have to tinker with it to get it working properly.

I should have explained myself more clearly , I chose to tinker to get it tighter , out of the box both were perfectly fine. I only spent 20 minutes to fine tune one of them, that’s all, not a big deal at all
Every mount under $3K will eventually require tinkering or maintenance at some stage as we are talking the low end of the market for 20kg rated mounts and they are not perfectly designed and machined like Swiss watches. If you want a 20kg + class mount which performs at ridiculously low PEC , guiding below 0.50 total rms then expect to shell out $7K to $12K or more ....

[RugbyRene (Rene)]

Originally Posted by Startrek

I should have explained myself more clearly , I chose to tinker to get it tighter , out of the box both were perfectly fine. I only spent 20 minutes to fine tune one of them, that’s all, not a big deal at all
Every mount under $3K will eventually require tinkering or maintenance at some stage as we are talking the low end of the market for 20kg rated mounts and they are not perfectly designed and machined like Swiss watches. If you want a 20kg + class mount which performs at ridiculously low PEC , guiding below 0.50 total rms then expect to shell out $7K to $12K or more ....

Thanks for the explanationMartin. I’m happy spending more on a mount if it means getting a low PE and excellent guiding.

[kosborn (Kevin)]

Originally Posted by RugbyRene

I’d be very interested to hear from people who have the following mounts but am open to others.

I'm interested too in any suggestions for a 20kg+ mount. Currently I've been researching the SW EQ8-R and the iOptron CEM70. Does anyone have any comments about those mounts, or as Rene said, any other suggestions?

Kevin

[JohnH]

I recently bought an iOptron CEM 40EC which I am very happy with, the mount is encoder based and belt driven so that keeps the PE under control. Pricing is mid range and carrying capacity is 18Kg. There is a non-EC version available (cheaper!) also but I paid the extra to be able to image without guiding when mobile...happy with my choice - it looks nice too!

[gregbradley]

Best to say what your budget is as there are a lot of choices these days.

A good 2nd hand AP mount should last you a long time of trouble free operation and good performance.

A good 2nd hand Software Bisque PME would also do it. But these are around $6000+ 2nd hand.

Greg.

[garymck (Gary)]

Before I gave up trying astrophotography in light polluted Geelong, and sold off all my premium stuff I had a Mesu 200. No tweaking, worked perfectly out of the box (crate :-) !!. I always got guiding as good as the atmosphere allowed, often as low as a TOTAL .15 arc seconds when the sky allowed. Pointing was exceptional. No one believes me, but plate solving would often put pixel on pixel, and I NEVER had a solve more than 3 pixels off......

If perfect guiding/pointing is what you want, I could highly recommend one.

FWIW
Gary

[The_bluester (Paul)]

What actually happened to the AZEQ6? I found with my Orion clone that the RA slowly became very erratic, with large and unpredictable PE. Then it stopped tracking altogether. It turned out that the clutch discs had compressed and the RA head was fouling on the fixed body of the mount, making it drag and stick, and eventually stop traking completely, tightening the clutches more only served to compress the disc further and make it worse, not better. I made sheet aluminium discs matching the dimensions of the clutch discs and added them underneath the originals and it has been flawless since.

[TrevorW]

Whats your budget because this is what makes the difference pay more better mount pure and simple, however I've seen some really nice images from lower priced SW EQ6 mounts being produced

[glend (Glen)]

Originally Posted by kosborn

I'm interested too in any suggestions for a 20kg+ mount. Currently I've been researching the SW EQ8-R and the iOptron CEM70. Does anyone have any comments about those mounts, or as Rene said, any other suggestions?

Kevin

Celestron CGX, image capacity 25kg on the standard tripod, much more on a pier. Belt drive, spring loaded worm gears with full range and stop adjustment. Home sensors, which can be set for any position you like. Able to image across the Meridian by up yo 20 degrees without having to flip. Soft and hard stops on both DEC and RA. Can be controlled via wifi, hand controller, or direct connect PC via USB port on the mount. Cekestron Planewave software (PWI) provides multipoint sky modelling for outstanding goto accuracy. Great guided accuracy (below 0.50rms on both RA and DEC, on my observatory pier). Cost is about $3700 at Bintel.
I have had one for over give years and it has not disappointed.

[Startrek (Martin)]

Rene,
Just a thought , what’s the focal length of your telescope ?
If it’s under 1000mm , you may be buying a higher end expensive mount ( +$7K ) and not use the full benefit and capabilities of it
My EQ6-R runs like a dream with 15kg on board , the only time my guiding waivers a bit is due to atmospheric issues not mount mechanical issues
Pushing 5 minute subs with dithering no issue, perfect round stars all night long
I image at 1000mm focal length
Just a thought
Martin

[The_bluester (Paul)]

I should add, I have a CEM70G and I am pretty happy with it.

The software needs some work and it seems that in the frenzy of astro sales over the last year that ioptron's QC may have slipped going by complaints on Facebook but it is hard to tell. People who are happy like me just get on with imaging and rarely feel the need to speak up while those with problems (Real or perceived) shout it from every available rooftop so the feedback is from a self selected group.

I know there were obviously some issues as they have released a new version of the motor control boards recently so I might have to follow up on getting a pair. I was getting around 0.7" total RMS guiding using the inbuilt 120mm focal length guidescope with my SVX80T on it and when I plonked the new 10" F4 on it with the OAG, I saw RMS as low as 0.45" in fairly average skies, but I only got an hour of clear sky that night. It might not stay that low but it never got down that low with the inbuilt guider at any time.

[RugbyRene (Rene)]

Originally Posted by Startrek

Rene,
Just a thought , what’s the focal length of your telescope ?
If it’s under 1000mm , you may be buying a higher end expensive mount ( +$7K ) and not use the full benefit and capabilities of it
My EQ6-R runs like a dream with 15kg on board , the only time my guiding waivers a bit is due to atmospheric issues not mount mechanical issues
Pushing 5 minute subs with dithering no issue, perfect round stars all night long
I image at 1000mm focal length
Just a thought
Martin

It's carrying an Esprit 100ED (550mm). With all the bits on it, it's just shy of 14kg. Though I would like to mount an 8" EDGE HD one day.

[Startrek (Martin)]

Originally Posted by RugbyRene

It's carrying an Esprit 100ED (550mm). With all the bits on it, it's just shy of 14kg. Though I would like to mount an 8" EDGE HD one day.

Rene,

You are currently imaging with a relatively short focal length ( 550mm ) so the EQ6-R mount will track and guide beautifully with this scope
I’m carrying a pretty big 8” f5 newt and she tracks and guide beautifully. I’ve seen folk stick a 10” f4 newt and 10” f5 newt on the EQ6-R and she handles it fine. Obviously good balance is essential and obviously they would be affected by wind gusts ( 20km/hr to 25km/he during guiding )
If you intend to make a huge jump to an 8” HD Edge ( 2032mm fl ) at some stage in the future then the EQ6- R will still perform well as you will have a huge reduction in payload ( only 8 to 9kg with all AP gear )
It’s your choice if you want to spend +$7k on the next class of mount for additional peace of mind
Cheers
Martin

[gregbradley]

If I might be so bold, an Edge HD is not a good choice as an imaging scope. Its got 200mm of aperture -that is good. But SCTs albeit the latest ones with the built in correctors (Edge) I don't think compete well with say GSO RCs of similar size and less cost. Bloated stars are the achilles heel of the SCT for imaging. I could be wrong and the Edge is good but check out images using them on Astrobin. SCTs are natively F10 which is hideously slow. The reducers on the original SCTs at least, are very basic and don't have a wide corrected field so you would end up using a small chip which exaccerbates the problem with zooming in too much. Modern imaging is using a fast scope (F5 or less) with a highly sensitive sensor (ASI/QHY 294, 2600 or 6200). That is the hot setup.

I have often been surprised at how good some of the smaller GSO RCs with carbon fibre perform. Way better than the initial sceptics foretold.

There are also numerous superb image examples on this site from those using 250-300mm Newt F4 or faster. That seems to be the scope of choice in this area.

CEM mounts on paper sound good with 3.5 arc sec tracking which is Paramount ME and AP mount type accuracy. What they are like in real life I don't know but they may be worth checking out. I have read many times the EQ6R is a good mount for the money and nothing comes close at its price point.

Greg.

[raymo]

Steve Massey uses a 12" Newt on his NEQ6 for AP/visual.
raymo