Ian McCallum

I hope this video will help clarify the situation. 🤔 20211212_214322.mp4

Do you mean these ones? I'm confused, unfortunately. The mount head was preassembled, when I got it.

Does it need to be arrested for that?🤔🤣

I did the collimation/alignment on that earlier today.😉

@neil phillipsif you're talking about how the mount hit the dirt, that was due to me removing the mount from the tripod, instead of leaving it on and folding the legs up. I forgot to remove the counterweigh and the mount toppled from the top of the tripod. I did try to catch it, but only broke it's fall somewhat. I was very, very lucky, as a bit earlier I was observing on concrete. I had moved it onto the grass, so that I could get a better view of Polaris. When the RA clutch lever is tightened up, it won't be a problem. It's just that I thought I had bent or bust something, but there's absolutely no sign of that. All the spindles, bolts, etc. are perfectly straight, thank goodness! The RA clutch lever probably scraps off the plastic before the fall, I must have missed it till I had a good close up look at everything, after the incident.🙄 Next time it goes on a trip, I'm going to ask the mount to send me a postcard!.🤣

I'm probably being petty, it being a relatively 'cheap' Chinese mount - but I just like things not to be so rough. Perhaps I should have invested in a more expensive mount or another brand? It's just that I can't justify any more money on a mount.

After removing the lever and rotating it by 90 degrees, I get the same result. 🙄 20211212_142342.mp4

I can remove the lever and shift it to another position, but it will still rest against the metal stop and scrap along the plastic box.

I was going over the mount, in detail afterwards. I think I've noticed little quirks that were already there, but I never noticed before. One is when the RA clutch knob is fully released and resting on the stop, it tends to hit off the plastic box below it. The box has one or two minor scrapes on it, but doesn't seem to be deformed. I'm probably being too picky. 🙄 20211211_231657.mp4

It's less hassle, isn't in.😉

I wasn't that bothered about the goto option, as it was more "it would be nice to have". The cost put paid to that...

Nothing fantastic to report from last night, apart from testing a second hand 2" diagonal I got. I've read that a diagonal shouldn't add or subtract from what you're viewing i.e. it shouldn't mar the quality of the image. Well with this diagonal, the image of the moon was crystal clear, using my SW 28mm 2" LET EP. It certainly saved me a lot of neck strain.

That's not good. I'll need to re centre the polar scope, mind you, it may not have been centred in the first place. I saw a YouTube video on it, just the other day. What a coincidence! 😮

I still had the counterweight attached. 🙄

The RA and DEC knobs turn freely and the bendy bolts aren't bent! 🙄

Rather than do things in my normal way, I decided to remove the mount from the tripod. 🙄 My new EQ5 Deluxe mount took a dive into the dirt! 😱 I nearly had a laxative moment, but thankfully there was nothing damaged, just my pride! Nothing was bend or broken and I very carefully took apart and cleaned the polar scope. 😮

I still need to get it and fit it yet!🤣

I may go for a modified webcam or something similar, not sure at the moment. I really want to get to know the mount, before adding loads of stuff to it. My rationale is to get to know a bit of the kit first, rather than get overwhelmed by trying to take everything in mentally and physically at once...

Thanks for the kind offer, but I've just pulled the trigger on the Enhanced kit from RVO.

I've just ordered the Enhance Dual Axis Motor Drive kit from RVO, as they have them in stock.

I'm still very tempted to just get the Enhance kit and I believe there's an interface to the laptop, if I want to do any guiding/imagine. It'll probably be just dipping my toe in the water and nothing serious, as it's far too expensive a rabbit hole to plunge down!😱 After all, poor weather, hobby killer toy telescopes and astrophotography put many off the hobby! Just checking with RVO if they have any of the Enhanced kits in stock...

Go right ahead. I like the idea of a goto type mount, as it would be a luxury for me, coming from a manual GEM or Dobsonian mount. The big problem is compared to the Enhanced dual kit, it's a lot of money!😱

It's something that I want to do a bit more research on. I don't like to commit to buy expensive things, until I'll really looked into the pros and cons.

I've probably used the wrong terminology. 🙄

I've noticed in YouTube videos that the SynScan stepper motors should louder than the DC motors, whilst slewing. I know that the stepper motors are more precise and faster at slewing than the DC versions, but the louder noise puts me off. Thoughts? 🤔