Ed the Fox

I used North/level alinement to start with in alt az mode.

It was an old Motorola phone I used. Just an update..... Had a spare Samsung S6 using android 5.1.1 so I thought I'd give this a try earloer today and again off it went in a different direction to the moon. I'm starting to wonder if it has a problem so I'll be calling FLO in the morning.

Took the scope out last night for the first time in ages using electric for the first time and an older phone as my current phone is now android 12 and the skywatcher app no longer works. Then all hell broke loose. Did a North/level alinement then asked it to go to Sirius. No. The scope pointed down and away from Sirius. Tried again .....no. So just asked it to go to another star instead. Again totally different part of the sky. So I started to wonder if the phone itself knew where is was in the world. It did but was unable to get a GPS lock. So after disabling the "find my location" on my phone things got slightly better though only once was it in the field of view after asking it to find a target. I will now have to look for another used phone that can get a GPS lock on my position. A frustrating evening all told.

I have a 130m on my Az gtl and it's no bother at all. It's very stable and at 4.1kg it's within it's weight limit. Having said that it's the longest OTA I'd put on the gti mount.

I put a 130m on my gti and that is pushing it.....

Done that myself.

@cajen2 suggests the BST Starguider and I totally agree. I purchased the 8mm and 15mm for my Skywatcher 130m. The difference is amazing though I still go back to my stock 25mm for the wide field views.

It would be good, and incidentally save them money, If they'd also install a timer to go off at say 11pm . Everyone is happy.

My regulated power supply arrived this morning so I can now use the mains to power the mount. No more going through AA batteries.👍

Yes putting your power tank on there is always a good idea. I'm going to hook mine up to the mains power whilst I'm in the back garden as I'm not sure how long 8AA batteries are going to last LOL.

Cheers Stu The tripod is very stable now especially since I filled it with kiln dried sand...

Thank you for starting this thread. It's great to look at other people's GTI set up. I posted a tread today in this forum about converting my eq2 to a GTI system using my Skywatcher 130m on it and having used it only once so far I was absolutely made up with it. Everything I wanted to look at the mount put it almost in the middle of the field of view I have seen write ups about how the skywatcher app to use your phone with the mount is not that good. I disagree as I found the app very intuitive and you could set parameters so you don't trash your scope. Having said that if you are going to use it on android I would use an older phone that is using android 10 and older as using it on android 11 is a bloody faff as you have to download an spurious app at the same time (which you can delete but still annoying as its a long winded process)

Hi Peter I have found the tripod really steady now it has sand in it. Not only that but removing the eq2 mount and replacing it with the Alt Az has reduced the weight carried by the tripod thus again increasing its sturdiness.

Hi SGL Last year I decided to get back into astronomy for the first time in over 30 years but budgets being tight I decided to buy second hand and wanted a reflector. Luckily I stumbled across a Skywatcher 130m on a motor driven EQ2 mount in near perfect condition (although I had to travel 80 miles to get it). This system was OK although the motor kept slipping and being in a light polluted town was struggling to find things. I was recently gifted a Skywatcher Alt Az GTI mount by my lovely wife as she'd been listening to me going on about things and how a go to mount would be perfect. So already having the EQ2 tripod with nothing wrong with it I set about converting my set up. Having removed the OTA and rings from the EQ2 mount I reattached the rings to a Skywatcher 210mm dovetail and sat the scope back in the rings. I then turned my attention to the extention tube and how to fit that to the mount. I purchased a 100mm M8 bolt and a couple of large M8 washers and slid the bolt through the tube. I then secured the bolt with a nut on the other side. This renders the bolt secure in the tube and can then be easily mounted/dismounted by a wing bolt on the underside of the mount with the addition of a large M8 washer. I now had to tackle the tripod as its a lot on the light side and I always thought it was top heavy when it had the EQ2 mount and scope attached. I decided to fill the legs with kiln dried sand and its free flowing, easy to get hold of and is relatively cheap (a 25kg bag was about £6). The center legs can be filled with no problem but the outer legs need sealing at the bottom. This I did with silicone sealant and let it dry for 24 hours before filling with sand. I now have a sturdy mount for the telescope to sit on. Speaking of which I found the Alt Az GTI mount an utter joy to have. It takes the 130m with no bother at all although at 4.1Kg it is approaching the mounts maximum weight and I did ask the good people at FLO if the scope needed to be counterbalanced which they said no, but I thought best to be on the safe side and do so anyway. To my delight the counterbalance rod fit the Alt Az mount without any adaptation and upon testing the balance found that the weight needed to be right at the end of the rod to balance out the scope. I would not put anything bigger than a 130m on the mount as its becoming a bit unwieldy and had to set the phone apps parameters so it does not tilt the scope any higher than 72 degrees thus not catching on the tripod legs. Apart from that I'm very happy with the result. Hope this'll give others ideas on how to upgrade on a budget. Thanks for taking the time to read this post.

Wow nice one guys some good stuff to look at there and not pricey either.

Hi all. With a growing amount of eyepieces and nowhere to put them apart from their own boxes, I was wondering what equipment you guys use and recommend for eyepiece storage. Cheers.

I too started again with astronomy this year after a 32 year hiatus and being in an astronomical society ect. Kind of gets into your blood and you never really shake it.

Sorry my bad and thanks for the thread link.

Hello all I was wondering if you could convert a skywatcher 130m and the eq3-2 mount it came with into a dovetail type mount to save all the faff but also for a design feature I have thought of for storage. Many thanks all.

Thanks for the replys guys, very informative. I would like to know where you get those springs from.

Hi folks. Just asking for your help and advice on a skywatcher 130m I just purchased off ebay. I want to remove the primary mirror to place a center spot on it to make it easier to collimate. Having read some of the posts in here it would seem that taking the whole assembly out using the screws surrounding the tube is a no go, so I was wondering how removing the 3 retaining screws at the back of the tube then removes the mirror, seems that that will not work either (image 1). The other thing is that the mirrors edge seems blemished in some way. I Have read that this is of no concern at the moment but could get worse (image 2) Some answers please. Ed

I have not bought anything as yet as no one has any of it in stock in the UK. Plus I got to save up for it.

Would a 200PDS on a NEQ6 Pro do the job?

All my days (head explodes). I did think about the eye pieces being inaccessible at some point but though of getting diagonals to combat this the finder looks underwhelming and needs a diagonal on it.

One thing I cannot find is how heavy the HEQ5 mount actually is. What it does say is it holds 9kg and the 200pds is 8.8kg so just on the cusp of its limits which means you add an SLR to it and....... Uh oh. So now I may go down to a 150pds and the HEQ5 mount as a Neq6 and 200pds is way outside my budget.