Mount choice

[phelophus (Manuel Garcia)]

Hi

I have a great interest in astronomy. But i never had the opportunity to buy a telescope due to I could not afford a descent one. I began to research telescopes, stores, dealers, brands, etc, trying to identify which telescope would be a good choice considering their price. So few days ago I decided to buy a Celestron 8" Schmidt-Cassegrain optical tube assembly with a dovetail rail compatible with CGE mount (I found a good bargain ). Now the problem is to choose a good mount and tripod. This have been difficult as the price of cge mounts are beyond my budget.

My interest are: observing and astrophotography (depending on the mount).

I would appreciate if someone could give an advice which mount would be good for my new ota or if I have to change the dovetail rail in order to assemble the telescope to a more economic mount.

I have around $500 for this.

Many thanks

[Alchemy (Clive)]

for astrophotography i would recomend a EQ6 Pro as your starting point.... sadly its out of your budget.

[Mike21 (Michael)]

Motor driven EQ6's and 5's (not Pros) come up from time to time in the Trading Forums in your budget range. You could even advertise in the Wanteds giving reasonable requirements and a bugdet and see what pops out of the woodwork.

I reckon you'd be hard pressed to get EQ6Pro quality too. But you might get something you can polar align and do short subs with, when you want to try photography. It's very unlikely you'll get anything new for less the $500 that you can enjoyable photograph from.

[phelophus (Manuel Garcia)]

Thank you for your answer. I think that for now I can't involve in astrophotgraphy. Anyway, I still need a mount and tripod for my OTA. I was considering to buy a cq-5 with the dovetail rail. Is there any cheaper option?

thanks again

[phelophus (Manuel Garcia)]

I dont mind if the mount is used or new

[marki]

My advice is to be patient and save your dollars until you can buy a decent setup. Astrophotography is an expensive business and you need to factor in the costs of a mount, decent OTA, camera, laptop and all the other bits to put it all together autoguiders etc. If you save enough to buy a decent mount it will be cheaper in the long run as it will grow with you and you will not have to replace it too soon. Take it from someone who has wasted a lot of money trying to do it on the cheap.

Mark

[dannat (Daniel)]

if you've got nothing the cg5 will probably handle the 8" for visual use - if you polar align/drift align well you might get 30sec exp out of it for photography. you would have to add a RA motor drive for this

[Starkler (Geoff)]

A cg5 will hold it, but it will wobble like a b@$#@!$ every time you touch the scope or try to focus and performance will disappoint. Please dont spend your hard earned on something likely to disappoint and then have to upgrade again at more expense later. Even a heq5 isnt sufficient imo.

[phelophus (Manuel Garcia)]

Thanks for your advices. Despite I would like to have the mount now to use the OTA, I understand that is better to wait a little more in order to find an eq6 at good price. It is just that I feel like in a car without wheels

[andrew2008]

Originally Posted by Starkler

A cg5 will hold it, but it will wobble like a b@$#@!$ every time you touch the scope or try to focus and performance will disappoint. Please dont spend your hard earned on something likely to disappoint and then have to upgrade again at more expense later. Even a heq5 isnt sufficient imo.

The CG5 ASGT should be fine for a C8 shouldnt it? Rated at similar weight carrying as a HEQ5 and has 2" compared with 1 3/4" tripod legs. Have seen plenty of people with a C8 and 80mm guidescope on CG5 on cloudy nights. Not saying that is ideal though but people are guiding with it and getting up to 5 min subs.

[phelophus (Manuel Garcia)]

Originally Posted by andrew2008

The CG5 ASGT should be fine for a C8 shouldnt it? Rated at similar weight carrying as a HEQ5 and has 2" compared with 1 3/4" tripod legs. Have seen plenty of people with a C8 and 80mm guidescope on CG5 on cloudy nights. Not saying that is ideal though but people are guiding with it and getting up to 5 min subs.

Thanks Andrew. If is the cheapest option, I think I will opt to buy one of these mounts. I would like to find somebody selling it under 500. I posted a message in the trade/wanted thread.

I used my little brother as mount but is not the same

[dpastern (Dave Pastern)]

Originally Posted by marki

My advice is to be patient and save your dollars until you can buy a decent setup.
Mark

Wholly agreed. OP - wait a few months and get the EQ6PRO. The auto go to will save you time and make it far easier to align things when imaging. It's quicker. It's way cooler. New, they are around 2k, 2nd hand, you probably can pick up one for around $1300-1400 at a rough guess. They're not perfect mounts, but they have a decent payload, they're relatively well built and reliable (*touches wood* for his own unit not to pay up!), they're reasonably accurate on goto. Price is excellent for what you get and you'd have to spend quite a bit more to get a better mount imho. It'll last you quite some time I suspect. Better to wait, then get a semi adequate mount now and find out that it's really not suitable for your needs/desires.

Dave

[Ian Robinson]

Put in a wanted advert and who knows , someone may just have a spare GEM collecting dust that they are willing to sell to you .

At that price you need to realistic - you wont get a modern / late model GEM with GOTO or an autoguider port for that kind of money, but you might score a GEM with dual axis drives and maybe a reasonable tripod.

Probably something like an old non-Goto CG5 or perhaps a Meade or small Vixen (a GP maybe) or EQ5.

Best of luck.

[dannat (Daniel)]

I agree the eq6pro would be the best but everyone has diff idea's of how much they will spend.. i really enjoy astronomy but would never spend more than $2 on it - why... don't know - maybe when i retire..I'm just the kind of person who doesn't spend a lot of money (excepting house/car/wife...actually wife is ok the kids are the problem, and mine are young)
Could i spend 2k - yes, just save my money -have more than that saved right now..am i going to spend it - No

So phelo - it comes down to a type of person you are, some just go out & buy the best, some save, some wait & never get, some buy something wait then save then trade & buy again

Am i loopy - yes my wife says so - in the end it will always have to be your own decision..good luck with it - be sure to let us know what you . though all the thinking in the world still might bring you the right outcome - sometimes we learn, sometimes we don't from previous actions.
One eg is nearly all members here recommend a dobsonian - i hired one froma club to see what all the fuss is about - and hated it- too bulky & only took it out few times -just didn't like it - it wasn't for me

[dannat (Daniel)]

Holy crap - a secondhand mount has just come up for 700 - maybe you could make an offer - its a bit above your limit but jump in

[DavidU (Dave)]

Originally Posted by dannat

Holy crap - a secondhand mount has just come up for 700 - maybe you could make an offer - its a bit above your limit but jump in

Yep, saw that too.

[marki]

Just toggled back here for the same reason . Can't say folks around here aren't looking after one another . I would go for it, find that extra $200, it's gotta be fate.

Mark

[phelophus (Manuel Garcia)]

I did it, I sent him a pm, lets see what happen. It seems that other guy is after it

[marki]

You never know, buyers often fold. I missed out on the takka mewlon 3 times before I finally got to the front of the line. Problem was he had already sold it to someone else outside of the forum, bugger. Keep an eye on the mounts and telescopes for sale and be ready to jump in straight away. You might also like to check out astromart.

Mark

[andrew2008]

That looks like a great mount for the money. Hope you manage to get it. The sirius is equivalent of HEQ5 so its slightly better than the CG5 and half the price of a new one.