Suitable Mount for a Celestron C11 or C9.25

[Mattwalker]

Hi Everyone,

After travelling to the Aoraki / Mount Cook Dark Sky Park on a recent holiday and viewing the Jewel Box and the Galilean moons of Jupiter through 11" and 14" SCT's I am thoroughly hooked! So I am looking to purchase my first OTA and mount, both used if possible.

I am only looking to do visual astronomy at this stage.

I have seen Celestron 11" and 9.25" SCT's that I am considering. These weigh 12.4 kg and 9.07 kg respectively.

So my question is would either of these mounts be suitable for the above scopes or am I pushing it ? Any other mount suggestions would be welcome:

1. Celestron AVX Equatorial (Payload of 13.6 Kg).
2. Skywatcher HEQ5 Pro (Payload of 13.5 Kg).

Thanks.

[Drac0]

Those weights are for the OTA only so you need to add anything you are connecting to it - finderscope, diagonals, eyepieces, etc. And you need to consider if you might move into imaging later too. Personally I would go for at least Skywatcher EQ6R, Celestron CGEM or iOptron CEM40 which all have ~18kg payload capacity - a must if you go for the C11.

Cheers,
Mark

[Merlin66]

I was using a NEQ6pro mount with my C11 for spectroscopy for many years.
Even with five (!!!!!) counterweights it performed very well.
I would recommend it.
Ken

[Camelopardalis]

Like the guys above, I’ve used my C11 on a NEQ6 for years… I’d recommend looking out for a mount that is happy with 20kg payload.

Just being frank with you though…there are cheaper ways of achieving a large reflector for visual only. They’re not necessarily easier to handle, but there are other options.

[Mattwalker]

Thanks for the replies everyone!

I now have a much clearer idea of the mount to get once the right scope comes up for sale.

Cheers,
Matt.