Rat cage free pier

[traveller]

Winter in Melbourne means clouds and rain, but at least it gives you sometime to sort out some to do projects. I started this project a few weeks ago http://www.iceinspace.com.au/forum/showthread.php?t=135718 , but it was put on hold during the school holidays :whistle:
Anyway, this is my approach to a rat cage free pier set up. The key is an adapter plate milled out of a 150 mm diameter 25mm thick piece of aluminium, which I anodised and spray painted (the dye bath didn't work).
I first bolted the adapter plate to the top plate of the pier (4xM12 bolts), the bottom of the extension pillar is then separated from the pillar and bolted to the top. Then I connected the extension pillar to the mount itself. The entire structure is finally positioned over the holes of the extension pillar bottom plate and secured.
And of course, the clouds and rain arrive on cue :mad2:
Hope this projects can give others similar ideas.
Cheers
Bo

[Tinderboxsky]

Looks good Bo. That should be rock solid.
Cheers
Steve

[AndrewJ]

Gday Bo
I just did something similar so i can mount either my EQ6 or my AZEQ5 onto a baseplate that was designed for a Meade LX200.
Whilst not as rock solid as yours ( based on the fact i made it from scrap ), its very flexible and easy to set up without any tools.

Andrew

[traveller]

Thanks Steve, will have to wait for a few more days given the weather.



Yes, I like the fact that EQ6 and the AZ EQ 6 have the same base plate profile. I am looking at the AZ EQ 6 with my tax refund (hopefully).
Bo

[AndrewJ]

Gday Bo

They might, but the EQ6Pro and AZEQ5 dont :-(
They use different base diameters and threads, which made making an adapter a bit more complicated, but not by too much.
The worst part was the 2 different thread sizes, but i got around that using a sneaky hold down method :-)

Andrew

[traveller]

Maybe you can do a small write up of your conversion Andrew, I am sure there are other members out there who would be interested.
Bo

[AndrewJ]

Gday Bo
Have attached a design sketch for my "pierette" and a few piccies of its pre assy onto my AZEQ5.
Basically, the EQ6 uses a 65mmOD x 5mm deep recess in the top plate to keep it central, and the AZEQ5 uses a 60mm x 20mm deep hole to do the same thing.
As such, my top plate uses a 60mm dia central hole for the EQ5 and the small 65mm recess allows the EQ6 to fit on the same base.
Both bases sit quite happily on it.
To allow me to fit the pierette to my Meade tripod/pier plate, i needed to make a through bolt with an interchangeable 8mm/10mm thread at the top and a 1/2"UNC-13 thread at the bottom.
To do this, i used a bit of SS pipe and permanently pinned a tapped coupler to the bottom. At the top, i have 2 threaded bolts turned down, such that their shanks will fit inside the tube.
Then i use a pin to hold them in situ. The bolt will only ever be loaded in tension, so a simple pin works very well.
I now simply screw the through bolt into the EQ6/AzEQ5 and then use the main tripod/pier bolt to apply downwards tension to hold it all together.
I found the assy worked OK but was rather finnicky when assembling, so i grabbed a bit of plastic downspouting and made a non structural spacer that allowed me to mildly pretension the through bolt and ensure it was always a set distance above the tripod/main pier plate, and held relatively still, prior to installing in the pier pipe. It also has the benefit of keeping the through rod central when assembling, and a hole the lower circular disk gives me a spot to hold the spare threaded insert

Andrew