Hello John,
Just for accuracy, Grove Creek Observatory has never had a C14 mounted on a Alhena mount. The C14 is still in the original sand cast mount, that has been retrofitted by me with stepping motors and and a Argo Navis.
We have never used a Alhena mount and do not own one.
Steven Williams.
Managing Astronomer.
Quote:
|
Originally Posted by ausastronomer
Mick,
As I mentioned yesterday your dropping a serious amount of coin on that scope which is about as good as it gets from an amateur point of view. Realistically it should be matched to a mount of similar quality. Peter Ward will probably tell you the Losmandy is up there, my American colleagues that have high end astrophotography setups tell me otherwise, but remember they are not Losmandy agents. The Losmandy is not quite to the same standard in terms of machining tolerances and resultant PE. The Losmandy is a mount well matched to a scope like a Celestron C14 not a scope costing 5 or 6 times what the C14 costs.
You already have the links to the mounts from Anssen Technologies. Peter Mellander who owns Anssen Technologies actually has a large Ritchey Chretien mounted on one of his own mounts. I also know that Joe Cauchi, one of Australia's leading astrophotographers has a 16"/F4.5 solid tubed Newtonian mounted on an Alhena mount. Grove Creek observatory has a C14 mounted on one, as does Sutherland Astronomical Society. The Alhena mount can be matched to Argo Navis. There were some issues with the electronics of the mount in the early days but I understand these have been resolved, talk to Peter Mellander about this. Gary Kopff from Argo Navis may be able to shed a little more light on this as I know he has been working very closely with Peter Mellander in respect to some new innovations for the firmware upgrade of Argo Navis. If there were to be issues with a mount of this size I would prefer to resolve it locally within Australia than via the USA.
If you were to go with an imported mount the best options would be the Paramount ME or the Takahashi EM-500. I have a colleague in the US (Kevin Dixon) who owns both a Takahashi EM-500 and EM-250 and has also used the Paramount ME and Astrophysics AP-1200 extensively and rates the Paramount ME as marginally superior to the Tak EM-500, which he also rates as superb. He didn't feel the AP-1200 was as good as the other two and the waiting time on it is several years. The wait time on the Paramount is about 6 months, while the wait time on the Takahashi EM-500 would be minimal. Optical Guidance Systems (OGS) who also make Ritchey Chretiens, more expensive in fact than those from RCOS, supply their 16" RC on a Paramount ME if ordered with a mount. Steven Lee has a Paramount ME on permanent loan from some American colleagues out at Coonabarabran.
http://www.aao.gov.au/local/www/sl/sl-digp3.html
Send Steven an email and ask him how he rates the Paramount ME to the Losmandy G-11 which he was previously using with an AP 130.
sl@aaocbn.aao.gov.au
http://www.takahashiamerica.com/EM500.htm
http://www.bisque.com/Products/Paramount/
Hope I have been of some assistance and enjoy your scope.
CS-John Bambury |