First mount for astrophotography

[robatman (Robert)]

Hi all,
I am wondering if i can get a mount and drive for astrophotography for around $400? i am looking to get an ED80 once I can save up again but prob not till end of year.

I am happy with second hand- and I dont have a telescope.

Any recommendations to keep an eye out for??

Thanks
Robert

[Ian Robinson]

You might pick up a secondhand LXD75 or CG5 for that much from Ebay.

Not great mounts , but more than enough capacity for you with an ED80 and even it the CG5 isn't Goto and has no ST4 port for autoguiding it's still got dual axis drives so you can manually guide quite adequately.

Go for the 2" steel tubular tripod rather than those woeful timber or aluminium legs.

[bmitchell82 (Brendan)]

well you could do that, but be prepared for some frustrations.

Unguided astro photography is CRUPOLA, doesn't produce good results. and you will be flat out taking subs of 1 minute.

You can try it out but at the end of the day money well spent now in the mount will save you endless frustrations.

try a eq5 or heq5. this mount is a fair price, but it will allow you to grow. there are some good mounts at the moment floating around second hand for good prices.

thats my opinion but yeah do what you would like but remember guiding is a big thing. without it your photos will be very average

[robatman (Robert)]

Thanks for the ideas- at least I have some options other than eq5 or 6.

Originally Posted by bmitchell82

Unguided astro photography is CRUPOLA, doesn't produce good results. and you will be flat out taking subs of 1 minute.......
but remember guiding is a big thing. without it your photos will be very average

i am starting to agree- my barn door rig is fine for really wide field, but for long FL i just cant turn the screw without some minute wobble of the whole thing. I cant imagine being smooth enough to manually guide on a eq mount.

will keep looking
Robert

[monoxide]

hi Rob,

i have the HEQ5 pro and its a great little mount that tracks and guides very well but unless you're happy to stick to small refractors it wont take you long to out grow it.

i'd say the max photographic load on a HEQ5 would be somewhere around 10kg which isnt much when you add the weight of the side by side plate and cameras etc but if you know that you wont go over this and wont in the future, its a good choice.

if i could go back and start again though i'd definately go for an EQ6 pro.

[bmitchell82 (Brendan)]

My current astro journey has taken me down the dob path, slowly acquiring all the bits i need.

so i started off with a dob till i could afford a mount to run it on. it came a little sooner than later so this week i pick up a eq6 pro. so now i have a 10" dob with full tracking abilitys that will stay as a visual rig until i get a guide scope. to which i will then get the guide camera and then a dslr. I got away with the whole set up very cheeply as i saw today that a 250mm skywatcher with a eq6 mount was close on 3500, yet i have just cracked the 2000 mark.

Like everybody who is into the photography side will say and just like monoxide just said, theres no point to getting something that will only just handle what you have now. Its a fact that you will want better and better equipment untill you cant get any better without going professional.

By all means try to make the entry into it as painless to the pocket as possible but yeah. your choice