Hi,
I've had my Mesu for 2 weeks and thought I would provide some detail for people who may be considering buying one.
Communication:
Lucas answered every email both pre and post purchase within 24 hours.
Delivery time:
I was quoted around 10 weeks, the mount was shipped just under 12 weeks (it was ready at 11 weeks, but an extra week was required for payment to arrive and shipping to be arranged.
Payment was made in 2 lots, a deposit of around 1700 Euro, and a balance when ready to ship.
The mount was shipped via TNT and left Lucas on a Saturday, it arrived in Melbourne Monday night. It was delivered to me in Geelong on Thursday morning.
On the Monday I received a phone call from TNT asking for details regarding the item so they could clear it from customs. A couple of hours later I received an email asking for payment of GST and fees, which I did via credit card. The mount was released from customs and awaited delivery.
Pretty painless really..... Total cost was about 9.5K, I was a bit unfortunate as the dollar dropped just as I had to pay the balance. Probably cost me a couple of hundred more than I expected due to this :-(
The mount:
Some may not like the "industrial" look, but I love it, everything is there for a purpose, very "Steampunk".
It is now fitted to a permanent pier. I have done only a bit of testing due to clouds but so far it performs performs beautifully. This is the first time I have had no dec issues to fight with in PHD. Seeing in Geelong varies from total crap to excellent. On my first night out seeing was terrible early in the evening, using 3 second guide exposures I got total rms figures of .7 arc secs. Late in the night the seeing settled to excellent and The rms dropped to totals of .2 arc secs.
Slewing is fast at 8 degrees per second,
I used SGP to test centring accuracy using plate solves. I performed the same test 4 times and got target centering to zero pixel error in both dec and ra, after 2 centring operations. The first centring operation was always accurate to 15 pixels or better. I thought this was pretty impressive.
At this point I am VERY happy with my purchase. Lucas was a pleasure to deal with, and the mount is so far everything I had hoped. The Sitech drive has facilities I have yet to use, but I personally really like it, but the I loved the old Bartels system.
There aren't any mounts with this capacity and performance at anywhere near this price. The comparative value is outstanding. I'm dreaming of a 16" f4 newt ......
If you are thinking of buying a premium mount you should consider this one.
So happy to hear that the installation went well and it performs as it is supposed to.
Friction feed mounts are so good compared to worm and gear based mounts, i.e fast response time with no backlash in DEC.
I seriously considered one of these when I was looking at a mount upgrade. Very low "periodic error" that isn't strictly speaking periodic Very smooth which makes it easy to guide out.
Probably the absolute best mount price wise for heavy loads.
If you don't mind me asking, what was the landed cost for you?
And what is the heaviest component in the mount that can be taken apart and transported?
I am currently looking for a high end mount and would consider this mount.
Clear skies.
John K.
Hi was about 9.5K would be a little less at todays exchange rate.
I think the mount weighs about 25KG. It is possible at extra cost to order a removable dec axis. Since I am permanently mounted I did not bother with this.
Very smooth which makes it easy to guide out. 
