New Alt/Az mount from GSO

[netwolf]

Hi All,

Andrews has a new GSO Alt/AZ mount for $249.
http://www.andrewscom.com.au/images/products/telescopes/accessories/gs_mount.jpg

This looks very much like the Voyager mount sold in the US.
http://www.cloudynights.com/item.php?item_id=1767

If so this is a nice little mount. has anyone tried one?
These are similar also to the Porta mount but the Arm is longer and might provide more room for a larger scope.


Regards
Fahim

[wavelandscott]

Bintel has had these for a while now but I'm not certain of the pricing at the moment...I bought one of the first ones in country as I felt it was very well priced relative to the Vixen (which is what I was intending to buy originally). I've been pleased with the mount and I find it a good compliment to my ED80...

While I have not had much experience with other refractor mounts and may not be a good judge, for use wth the ED80 for moon and planets etc. it works a treat for me and my visual interests.

Cheers!

[Starkler]

These mounts have been available at Bintel and Andrews for six months or more.

They differ from the Voyager sold in the US by having a plate for fixing tube rings to, rather than having a dovetail fitting. There is a GSO dovetail fitting available for $50 which fits.

I took my ed115 to Bintel to give this mount a test run and found it wasn't up to the task of holding this refractor satisfactorily. The tripods max height is also considerably lower than a Vixen porta mount. I believe the 20lb capacity rating to be overly optimistic.

I would not recommend this mount for anything but a short tube small refractor or maybe up to a 6" mak.

I have read rumours that GSO will bringing out a beefier model in the near future. If they can get it right it should be a good seller as there is a market void for a reasonably priced beefy alt-az mount just waiting to be filled.

[Dave47tuc]

Those mounts are much the same as a porta mount.
But on the andrews web site,
http://www.andrewscom.com.au/site-section-10.htm
The mount is a SkyTee $499.
I copied this pic from the web site.
Wonder what it will carry?

[netwolf]

That Tee mount looks much better. Its similar to the Giro mounts which are quiet well made. I had a quick look through Bintel and they have the mount I mentioned plus the also have a Skyview II listed which is about 100$ more I think it comes with a better tripod as it looks much the same. They also had a orion Alt/Az mount that looks like the Tee mount Dave mentioned. The Orion Tee mount is listed as bein easily able to carry a 9.25 SCT or 8" reflector easily. And that too it can carry the same weight on both sides.
I wonder how this Orion Alt/Az or GSO Tee mount compare to other Tee designs.

[Wavytone]

Had a play with the Orion AltAz (Tee) mount at Bintel on Saturday, looks the same as the photo posted by Dave47Tuk, on a steel-tube tripod with a Skywatcher 150mm Mak on it. Had a look through it with a decent magnification to see how it responded to vibration (very good).

The Andrews page suggests 10kg load and I'd say its reasonable - and you might want a counterweight (another scope).

It was solid enough - better than most of the portable equatorials I've tried over the past 30 years. The axes were a tad stiff though I suspect with a little use it will loosen up a bit (or maybe some WD40/graphite will do the trick). Clutches were a big vague with respect to knowing whether they were holding or not, so balancing the scope will be important.

Unless you're doing imaging/photography I really just don't see the point in an equatorial head, for visual hopping round the sky this is fine. The mounts I really admire for simplicity are the "tablet" and "stack" from Bray Imaging, they claim they can carry a C14 on one...

Cheers.