Belt mod upgrade

[Mukv]

Greetings

I thought I would share the experience of upgrading to belt drive on my NEQ6 Pro with a few words and pictures.

Firstly the reason why I decided to do this is simple ish. a few night ago while imaging c2014 E Jacques I noticed a few short trails on the surrounding stars on

some but not all subs and I decided to call it a night and put my toys away like a good boy! but before parking to home I swung across to Andromeda for a quick look

but during the slew there was a sort of dragging or slowing of the motion of the tube and the motor sound seemed  to change to indicate a tight spot so I assumed

it must be clutch slippage because I had not rebalanced after removing camera the 300 PD S is a heavy beast and balancing it quite crucial to get the best performance.

The noise during slewing between targets is quite something if your not accustomed to it but this particular time slewing to home it seemed quite pronounced,

so at this point I decided to give the old girl a good servicing!

While gathering my tools and buying fresh lube for the up and coming servicing session I was struck with the option to  go large ( kids just back with Mc D ) and do a little upgrade.

A quick email and visit to http://www.rowanastronomy.com/index.htm and I went large and ordered the belt upgrade!

After a phone call from Rowan astronomy to confirm my order, it is in the post and due to arrive tomorrow 19/8/2014, that's it time to swing spanners and hammers at the mount

opened obsy and powered up the laptop, on screen was the PDF guide to this project ready to follow.

After removing the tube from the mount a whole  hour of reading and a cup of tea later the mount was nearly naked.

The guide is very good with extremely helpful photographs and at no point was there any head scratching. 

At the point of taking these pictures I decided to leave it till the kit arrives tomorrow.

I'm looking forward to the next stage because it is another element of the hobby that brings satisfaction in buckets!

at this point I don't mind the cloudy skies

later guys

Andy

[DrRobin]

Nice little write up.  I know the guy I sold my EQ6 to is thinking about one of these.

NEED         Clear Skies and GIRLFRIEND ( Giving up on both )

You might find they are mutually exclusive.

Robin

[tingting44]

nice, look forward to seeing your progress

[laser_jock99]

I have an in EQ currently in bits. I have done some of the belt mod - just waiting for the new Syntrek steppers to arrive for the 'The Fully Monty' of upgrades.

[Mukv]

how much better are the Syntrek steppers?

do you have a link for the upgraded steppers?

Andy

[Mukv]

Greetings

less than 24 hours from the phone call with Rowan engineering and the postman handed me a pack containing my upgrade kit that's good service both post office  and Derek on the other end of the phone.

I opened the packet to reveal all the parts in labelled plastic packets plus printed instructions each section of the instructions makes identifying the relevant parts packet very easy so if I mess up it's me  on the firing line.

There is also a set of small tools allen key wrenches 3 sizes and a custom  pair of tweezers for the fiddly bits of the operation, it looks to me like these guys actually use telescopes not just sell the parts.

So now it's time to put the kettle on and move to the obsy, I'll add more pictures and words later.

Andy

[blinky]

Cool, will be keeping an eye on this, its something I keep thinking about doing myself...

[tingting44]

nice one, good luck

[sloz1664]

Hi Andy,

Are you upgrading any of the bearings while you have the old girl stripped and on the bench (ooo...err missus...). I'd check all the bearings for smoothness and replace wherever necessary.

Check out Astrobabies guide the EQ6 refurb and also have a look at the section to "supertune" the old girl.

cheers

Steve

[Mukv]

Greetings

No pictures yet but progress has been slowed by some type of thread lock on the grub screws holding the brass gear to the worm shaft used 5 of my 2mm allen wrenches just to remove the RA gear  and no amount of force is going to move the other one. Looks like it's out with the minicraft drill and drill down the side of the threads to get the last one out.

Hi sloz1664 the bearings were going to be changed untill I looked these over, these seem to be quite solid and smooth the whole mechanical side of the mount is very well lubed with a white grease I will get a picture later if I manage to get this stubbon grub screw out! the supertune seems a good idea while she is stripped nekid I'll lube her in all the right places make sure she is tight where she needs to be tight and slippy where she needs to be slippy, the only sounds from this old gal from now on will be a contented hum as I make her head spinn looking at stars!

laters guys

[Mukv]

Greetings

Everything is back together and other issues to slow me down next thing is to setup clearances on the worm shafts etc. All washed and re greased no rumbles grumbles or squeaks,

Andy

[r3i]

Greetings

No pictures yet but progress has been slowed by some type of thread lock on the grub screws holding the brass gear to the worm shaft used 5 of my 2mm allen wrenches just to remove the RA gear  and no amount of force is going to move the other one. Looks like it's out with the minicraft drill and drill down the side of the threads to get the last one out.

I encountered the thread lock on my mount when I changed the bearings and did the belt mod.  I used one of those 'pencil blow torches' to carefully heat up the lock ring for a minute or so and this softened the adhesive enough to be able to unscrew the ring.  A special tool like the one on the Rowan Astronomy site for unscrewing the ring will make the job a lot easier

too: http://rowanastronomy.com/productsa2.htm#neq6beltkit

Edit: Actually I've just realised you're talking about something completely different.  First time I've heard of thread lock on the brass gearing, though the blow torch approach also apply here.

[Mukv]

Greetings

Job complete, the upgrade to a belt drive system is quite easy to do as long as you have a few extra tools in my case a means to remove a stubborn grub screw in a brass gear. In the end I drilled down alongside the grub screw as I was down to my last 2 allen keys, not pretty but effective. The pdf guide online is one of the best I've seen for any type of assembly build type job ( Ikea take note ) I never had to ask my 15 year old daughter for help not even once!

There is one tricky part in the build where the motors had to be located in the housing and fed into the belt loop this is where all those years of playing gynecologist with the wife payed dividends, nimble fingers and a head torch are essential in both situations.

In conclusion the upgrade was very easy to do if you read the guide and follow it closely, I tried to anticipate a step and fitted an idler plate to the motor when it should have been fitted to the housing no biggie but avoidable if I read the next bit of text and looked at the pictures.

I would like to say a big thankyou to Rowan Astronomy for a fast friendly service and a product that resolves issues on the NEQ6 Pro that should never have made into production.

If I can do it so can you!!

Clear skies please I want to play!

Andy

[m.tweedy]

NEXT

NEQ6 Wedge.

You know you will.

[JohnC64]

Glad to hear it was easy to fit and very interested to hear what the improvement to your mount and tracking is after fitting this kit.

Cheers for posting

John