The_bluester
22-08-2013, 01:22 PM
OK, posting in here as I still regard myself as a beginner.
My main scope is a Celestron CPC925 GPS. Great scope and I am very happy with it. However due to it's nature I obviously have a fairly limited max FOV. Some reading recently left me wondering about piggy back mounting a rich field scope to it. All the benefits of ease of use of the computerised Alt/Az mount though I have found it a bit limiting lately, I wish the encoders were on the scope side of the drive clutches not on the motor side so I could change targets quickly by releasing the clutches and pointing manually without waiting for it to slew by itself.
Has anyone tried something like this, mounting a small, relatively cheap widefield refractor to something like the 925 on Alt/Az? Ideally I would like something suitable to a 2" EP as most of the ones I am using the most often are 2" format and I would like to be able to use them, pending exit pupil considerations and so on with the different focal ratio.
Balance I would not expect to be too great an issue, the only balance problems I have had was when I tried hanging a hulking great pro level DSLR off the visual back and trying to take exposures of objects that were well down the sky. I do have a dovetail rail mounted to the bottom of the OTA which would let me tweak balance with some weights.
A recent night started me thinking about this when I realised how much I had to motor around to take in the nebulosity of Eta Carinae with the limited TFOV of the 925 and my EPs and it is either something piggy back something with the convenience of the electronic tracking of my current scope or perhaps try to get a secondhand dob past the minister for finanace.
My main scope is a Celestron CPC925 GPS. Great scope and I am very happy with it. However due to it's nature I obviously have a fairly limited max FOV. Some reading recently left me wondering about piggy back mounting a rich field scope to it. All the benefits of ease of use of the computerised Alt/Az mount though I have found it a bit limiting lately, I wish the encoders were on the scope side of the drive clutches not on the motor side so I could change targets quickly by releasing the clutches and pointing manually without waiting for it to slew by itself.
Has anyone tried something like this, mounting a small, relatively cheap widefield refractor to something like the 925 on Alt/Az? Ideally I would like something suitable to a 2" EP as most of the ones I am using the most often are 2" format and I would like to be able to use them, pending exit pupil considerations and so on with the different focal ratio.
Balance I would not expect to be too great an issue, the only balance problems I have had was when I tried hanging a hulking great pro level DSLR off the visual back and trying to take exposures of objects that were well down the sky. I do have a dovetail rail mounted to the bottom of the OTA which would let me tweak balance with some weights.
A recent night started me thinking about this when I realised how much I had to motor around to take in the nebulosity of Eta Carinae with the limited TFOV of the 925 and my EPs and it is either something piggy back something with the convenience of the electronic tracking of my current scope or perhaps try to get a secondhand dob past the minister for finanace.