EQ6r-Pro

[gregbradley]

I read a review of this mount. It seemed pretty positive except for 2 items.
There was a criticism of the latitude adjuster for polar alingment being very hard to use and 50% of the time it would not engage the thread.

Is that still the case?

Also a quality concern with a disc that fell off that keeps one of the belts in place.

How have you found yours? Any other issues?

I am looking for yet another mount to mount my 130mm APO so I can image with 2 rigs at the same time.

Greg.

[Startrek]

Greg,
The Az and Alt bolts on the EQ6-R are M12 so quite substantial
A lot of folk have criticised these bolts , in particular the rear Altitude bolt with lever , but I have no issue with them as your only adjusting a few times until your polar aligned. I just give my bolts a spray with lithium grease which helps a lot
Like everything you get use to using it , agreed the rear Alt bolt could be designed a little better but it’s current design was never going to stop me buying the mount
All mounts whether low budget or expensive have some kind of design deficiency
Yes I’ve seen a video of one of those discs falling off but I have 2 x EQ6-R mounts ( early and later versions ) and have used them for 3 years without any issue at all with the belts
Just remember this mount is only $2.5K not $10K . In my opinion excellent value for a well designed , good quality,reliable and solid mass produced 20kg class mount
Cheers
Martin

[Imme]

I did the belt mod on mine (was still ok before I did it) and it runs well with approx 14kg on it (flt132 and other bits and pieces).
I have no trouble doing 10min guided exposures. I can’t recall last time I threw a sub out due to star trailing.
Meridian flips no worries with SGP
Plate solves fine (normally gets what I’m looking for on screen then hones in to centre on first solve)
The mount won me a Malin last year so it can mix it with the bigger boys toys.
For the price you can’t go wrong in my opinion.

[gregbradley]

Thanks Martin, that is reassuring.



I thought the current EQ6r-Pro already had belts.

Greg.

[Startrek]

Greg,
Both my EQ6-R mounts ( 2018 and 2019 versions ) have belts on Dec and Ra
The EQ6-R is belt driven and only belt driven, whereas the Skywatcher EQ6 , NEQ6 , Saxon EQ6 , Saxon NEQ6 etc etc.... are gear driven ( I wish they wouldn’t rebadge mounts )

Skywatcher AZ EQ6 and Saxon AZ EQ6 GT are belt driven

I’ve noticed in a few posts when folk mention about their EQ6 mount there’s a bit of confusion over the drive system
A lot of folk convert both old and newer EQ6 or NEQ6 mounts from gear to belt drive

Martin

[AdamJL]

The latitude bolts are indeed a pain but nothing major in the grand scheme of things.