Are there any local belt drive kits (eq6) available?

[coldlegs]

Are there any local belt drive kits (eq6) available?

Looking into doing this mod and found some European sites but none here or in the states. Does anyone know of any?

Found these
http://tavcso.hu/?o=termek&id=248&n=en

http://www.teleskop-austria.at/shop/index.php?m=2&kod=sbau-bor-das-6p&lng=slo

Cheers
Stephen

[slowflow]

Have a look on robotics or cnc machining, should find plenty however supply from the US is frequently cheaper

http://www.smallparts.com.au/store/categories/?Timing

http://www.sdp-si.com/catalogs.htm

http://www.huco.com/products.asp?p=true&cat=319

[whzzz28]

Wow... 129 Euro for some gears and belts?
What a rip.

Got my gears/belts for my HEQ5 for about 20 euro (plus shipping).
Mind you i had to turn down the gears, but if you know someone with a lave then its not hard.

Then again - i haven't belt driven my HEQ5 yet. It's on my list of things to do.

[Poita]

Is there a lot of benefit to the belt drive, over say something like the Aeroquest worm and bearings sets, or the 'WS2' process here:
http://www.andysshotglass.com/introduction.html

When I had an EQ6 I was interested in the belt drive setup, but never got around to invesitgating it properly.

[coldlegs]

Thanks for your response guys but from what I've read so far the gears have to be very accurately bored out to match the stepper which I don't want to get into. I would also have to figure out exactly which gears to buy hence why I'm looking for a kit. Would like to use paypal and not a credit card as the europeans want it done but can't find anyone so far. I'm surprised one can't get a kit from the states. Still looking.

Stephen

[asimov]

I've been wanting to do this to my old black non GOTO EQ6 for quite some time. Still looking as well.

[Kunama]

Couple of times when buying gear (car bits) from Europe I have used the card method but then after the transaction is complete I cancel that card and get the bank to send me a new one with different card number.

[MrB]

Hi Stephen,
I looked into doing this but never got around to it. Your thread has got me looking into it again.
Apparently once this mod has been done, you have to use EQmod only and cannot use your hand controller anymore.
Are you aware of any workarounds for this?

Edit: seems the only workaround is to not change the original 3.9167 ratio.
Trying to find a 47 tooth pulley is proving to be difficult...

[coldlegs]

Simon, I think you will have difficulty finding a 47 tooth gear commercially so it would have to be custom and pricey! I don't use the controller to goto as my gear runs off a computer which will simplify the mod gearing. Don't think there are any workarounds for it. I guess if there's enough of us we could try to find an IIS member with excellent lathing skills to center bore a small run of gears that could be made available to IIS members. That might work.
Stephen

[LewisM]

I can think of an excellent machinist, resident IIS member, in Brisbane. He may not want to though, so will let him come forward.

He's made some INCREDIBLE gear, some of it commercially available...

[MrB]

I can machine it myself but was trying to avoid it.
Cheers guys.

Edit: Shame someone hasn't come up with alternative firmware for the Synscan.
I wonder what the chances are we could get the source code from Synta? :lol:

[coldlegs]

Simon
Apologies...I was completely wrong about 47 tooth gears.
This english mob has them..

http://www.hpcgears.com/newpdf/timing_pulleys_2.5mod.pdf

worm gear partno. 47T 2.5-8
stepper gear partno. 12T 2.5-8
timing belt T2.5/177

All from this article
http://morningstarobs.weebly.com/belt-drive-mod.html

They are not cheap .. probably AU$100-110 inc postage so those europeans
are looking better all the time.

Using these will keep the hand controller functioning normally.

cheers
Stephen

[MrB]

Awesome! cheers.
Machining these would be rather easy, but time consuming.
Factoring the time it would take for me to machine(actually, setting up to machine takes 90% of the time) and what my time is worth to me, it is still cheaper to buy, even at $100 per pulley.
I tend to only machine things I can't buy, or things that are far too expensive to buy.

The 47 tooth pulley you linked to is listed as only £12.27 = ~AU$18.85, not sure where you got the price?

Yeah that was my reasoning for the 47 tooth pulley.
I wish to keep the Synscan operational for portability... it also makes the mount more attractive if I decide to sell it sometime in future and the belt drive mod works with both the Synscan and EQmod.

:thumbsup:

Edit: Damn, only available in T2.5, not in MXL :(

[coldlegs]

I figure

47T 2.5-8 (X2) plus 12t 2.5-8 (X2) plus T2.5/177 (X2) = 57.96pounds= AU$88.94 plus postage etc

Unless you only want to do one axis.
Cheers
Stephen

[MrB]

My apologies, I thought you meant for the 47 tooth pulley :lol:

Yeah I wish the 47 was available in the MXL or 2mm pitch GT2 ranges as these will fit the mount without having to modify the housing unlike the T2.5's.
Have found MXL pulleys for about half the HPC T2.5 price, only 48 tooth available tho :(

Might be good for you tho, the MXL has 2.032mm pitch so are smaller than the T2.5 (so no modding the mount body) they accept Paypal too:
http://www.motionco.co.uk/timing-pulleys-timing-pulleys-aluminium-c-25_35_48.html

[coldlegs]

Got a response from one of the europeans and they do paypal. Alas they are expensive at about AU$190 delivered. Still that's for 4 modified pulleys ready to go. Not sure if this is the 4/1 mod or not. Better give them another email.

They are here
http://www.teleskop-austria.at/shop/index.php?lng=de&m=2&kod=sbau-bor-das-6p

Stephen

[MrB]

Placed an order with Motionco for two each of 12 and 48 MXL pulleys and two 80tooth belts. Was $50 including shipping. Will have a go at making a 47tooth pulley.

I tried to place orders for GT2 belts and pulleys which have far superior positional accuracy and would have only cost $17 more all up, but both SDP and B&B only accept credit cards. Their loss.

Looking forward to receiving these and fitting them. In the meantime I'll push ahead with machining the 47 tooth pulley.

[Poita]

I just use those prepaid credit cards from the post office. No risk.

[MrB]

Wasn't aware of those, thanks!

For anyone thinking of the same, here is what I ordered:
------------------------------------------------------
2 x MXL Rubber Timing Belt, 80 T (BMXL080) = £5.52
2 x Aluminium MXL Pulley, 48T, 5mm Bore (PL048AL) = £13.22
2 x Aluminium MXL Pulley, 12T, 3mm Bore (PL012AL) = £6.92
------------------------------------------------------
Sub-Total: £25.66
Shipping (Shipping to Australia): £7.00
Total: £32.66