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Whats your thoughts on.........


simmo39

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Whats your thoughts on using a railway sleeper for a pier? I can get a hold of a well used on that is solid and it seems to be a easy way of getting a pier for a HEQ 5. 

any advice would be appreciated.

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Give it a try. Proper railway sleepers would have been required to have good dimensional stability and would be strong enough to bear a heavy load.

Even if it does move a little bit, that would only need a small tweak to your polar alignment. And any pier is better than no pier :smiley:

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a cool way for making a soild pier is to get a peice of plastic pipe say 8 inch die  plonk it in the ground where you need it about 2 foot or so, stick some threaded rod in useally 4 to attatch your mounting plate too and fill with good concreate,this is not my idea i think i read it on here, so thanks to who ever posted it.i hope this was helpful.all the best charl.

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Give it a try. Proper railway sleepers would have been required to have good dimensional stability and would be strong enough to bear a heavy load.

Even if it does move a little bit, that would only need a small tweak to your polar alignment. And any pier is better than no pier :smiley:

as much as i know what your saying with any pier etc, but do you want to go through the hard work of doing it to be constantly fixing it, it might be ok but id have a long ponder.

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I have a wood pier.


It's made from four 4X4's glued and stud-bolted together, in the hope that movement in each section might cancel out to a degree.


Mounted in pea shingle.


Set up and drift aligned about a year ago, I haven't adjusted it since.


PA is probably out and probably changes but so far PHD has been able to cope.


I should probably drift align again now that it's had time to "settle down".


Wedge mounted Meade F6.3 200mm SCT.


Michael

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By chance I came across this article today.

http://practicalastronomy.com/diy-low-cost-telescope-pier/

The chap who made it used a wooden gate post and is happy after two years since building it.  I thought railway sleepers were impregnated to repel water so they wouldn't rot.  If you google something like "DIY telescope pier" you'll find all kinds of ideas, including an upturned plant pot!

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Well good or bad idea or not, Im going to get a couple of railway sleepers and see what I can come up with. If it dont work, well live and learn. Will post pics as I go along. Thanks for all the replies.

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