Percivel

Hello, I have for a while now been revamping a 14 inch Meade SCT that I had to defork as the mount failed. An unfortunate result of the defork was a dint where one of the forks refused to come off and made a cosmetic only but very annoying dint. First world problem but this is a hobby and it is nice for things to look good. So I tried numerous ways for getting rid of it, including suction pads car body work tool etc. Nothing worked. But what worked was the heat and cold method. Got a hair dryer and heated up the area until it was as hot as it would get. Then got a can of air, held it upside down and blasted it. Dint popped out and there is now only a very small crease present that you would struggle to see. Wish I had taken pics of this as it works briliantly. Was quoted £300 quid to get the dint removed, cost me a fiver with this method. Worth a try if you are ever in this predicament.

Been a while since I posted on this. Now got the scope on a celestron cgxl which holds it perfectly. Scope is fitted to the mount via a custom made cradle fitting from orion optics uk. The cradle makes it very easy to achieve balance as the scope is already secured via the dovetail and you can slide the quite heave scope backwards and forwards in the cradle fitting. PS deforking a 14 inch sct from the original fork mounts is not for the faint hearted.

The meade 14 inch is a bit heavier (apparently) than the celestron. The cgxl may take it but just cannot get a definitive answer. Don't want to buy it and find its not up to it

Seems impossible at the mo to get an EQ8. Found some CGXL in stock and contacted the supplier to ask if it can comfortably take the 14 inch. But they never got back to me.

Flexible on budget. Secondhand also quite acceptable. Always buy used when I can.

As can be seen from my previous posts I am now looking to remount my meade 14 inch sct. My options appear to be an EQ8 or a celestron cgxl. However the opitron 70 keeps springing to my mind. Googled all to death but stil cannot make my mind up. The eq8 should be able to take the weight. The other two may be bit of a trade off, but they on paper might be the better option. confused.com!

Put in a post of how my handset failed. Managed to overcome that and then bang! Mount has now given up the ghost. Drives gone sensors failed. So I have bitten the bullet and deforked the OTA from the mount. Not an easy task and ended up with a small dent on the tube. Fortunately optics and mechanics are still sound. So I am now looking at remounting it onto an EQ mount, but despite googling for sometime I cannot for the life of me find a cradle and ring system that I can use. I really do not want to just attach a dovetail as I think that due to the weight it may flex or even fall off. Hence why I think cradle and rings are the way forward. Does anyone know a supplier who can help?

Its not that, the scope is jamming in whatever way you turn it left or right .

Ok bit of an update. I stripped the handbox one more time and carried out a massive clean. It now works. Just slightly dimmed. hard to see the text in daylight but at night it is fine and all buttons work. Went for one last clean as it seems the handbox is no longer available to buy on its own. Now only one other (massive) issue. RA drive has slammed to a halt and is making a terrible grinding noise when moved. Now having to look at the nightmare of deforking the scope. Scope is brilliant but time for a new mount.

No. For me it is managble to take the tripod and fork with ota and assemble in garden . Other passion is power lifting. 6 feet 4 and 18 stone.

Thanks for all of the replies. The issue is the not so rare Text fading. Tried cleaning etc and to no avail. Although one ordered it says avaialable as from the 1/5/21. Looking around the web and from what I can see not very confident on that date. Be so annoying, its a 14 inch scope. Superb optics but although very computer confident, might end up buying a telrad and converting it to a push to. Cannot seem to get the gist of using a PC instead of the handset. Don't use apple always android and Microsoft. From what I have read this seems to complicate the issue. I however really do appreciate all of your replies, clearly a very friendly forum.

Thanks. Now ordered. Hopefully hand set will last another month!

Hello to everyone as this is my first post. Been an advid but perhaps a slightly old school astro sort of guy as never used the deemed newer type of tech. Currently use a Meade lx200 GPS. Quite old now and like many the handbox is giving up the ghost. Seems impossible to get another one so been looking at changing to a wireless or even wired PC control. But on the reading I have done I get the impression that without a working handbox I cannot do the set up mode of align etc. Have I got this wrong?