aStone

This is how I did it a couple of days ago. The capture details are in the video description

Finally managed to finish the platform! I also consider myself to be a dummy so this topic was perfect for me, thank you! For comfort, I added removable wooden legs, adjustable furniture feet are attached to them. That gives me the height of the small table I used before (can be seen in the background). I could have drilled the holes for the stop bolts a bit closer to the edge of the arch but I'm going to replace one of the stop bolts with a micro switch so it should give me a few extra minutes. Considering my skills, I'm quite happy with the result. After first test run I think I found the optimal speed of the motor, however there is still a small drift. Acceptable for visual with wider FOV, I reckon, but noticable for imaging. Nevertheless, I believe it will improve my planetary imaging this season. I didn't expect it to use it for DSO but I tried anyway, 1-2 sec exposures are doable. I have the EQ motor with the shaft coming out at the top. I found that the coupling screw supplied with the motor doesn't fit 8mm rod. So I had make the end of the rod thinner, about 6 mm. One could also get a different coupling screw or use a thinner rod but that would also require different size of bearings.