Baader SteelTrack focusers at First Light Optics

[daz]

I had the steel track to look at a while ago, and was very impressed with it - now that the SteelDrive is incoming, this might need a rethink for the big newt!

[FLO]

Is there one for the Lunt FS60 solarscope? the original has become a bit of a pain.

Olly

We don't handle Lunt scopes Olly so I don't know (Ian King is a Lunt dealer, he might know). The Baader adapter set includes:

1) M90 female threaded collar (with three knobs for easier handling)

2) M68 (Zeiss) male thread

3) M80 x 1.5 (Zeiss) thread

4) tube flange with 96mm diameter suitable for the Skywatcher Evostar series with 100mm tube diameters.

HTH

[Deneb]

Just had a delivery of one of these lovelies for my SW ED80 DS Pro...

Thanks for posting up the collimation info. John

Nadeem.

[Coco]

Just had a delivery of one of these lovelies for my SW ED80 DS Pro...

Thanks for posting up the collimation info. John

Nadeem.

Hows it looking mate? does it add more weight to the rear, if so how much. any photos of it fitted?

[Deneb]

Actually its awaiting Collection from FLO. Im actually not impressed with it, tell you the truth Guy. From what I understand the original focusers were better made with metal grub screws fitting into the rotating recess area, these are equipped with Nylon Screws, supposedly to lessen any metal grinding when rotated. If i had to choose between two focusers a Steeltrack or a Monorail, i'll go for the Monorail, only that is got a nice thick R&P bar underneath & two locking screws on top & bottom of the focuser. Which this baader aint.

But then saying that, hind sight is a wonderful thing, I've had a few moonlights in the past, so I hae gone for one of these instead. The moonlight focuser build quality is like the nice build quality provided with my AA115 Focuser.

Nadeem.

[Coco]

Most Chinese makers use this type of arrangement, the grub screw does sit in a V channel so should be safe..

The focuser isnt supposed to rotate with your gear on..

Perhaps an engineers supplies visit for the faint hearted..

Was looking for a good review, had high hopes for this, I'd like to know how much weight could be hung at the Zenith..

[Deneb]

Sorry mate, but its a personal choice did not like idea of the focuser having plastic screws, its not exactly I've got a webcam on it. Regarding its rotation, I would have thought that if you wanted to orient the camera to the right angle having the focuser rotatable would be the advantage, instead of unscrewing & mounting your camera again, i've used this method on all my rotatable focusers & never had a problem. It would also be nice with two locking screws instead of one.

As I said, i've gone for a moonlight, no worries with what amount it would take.

Nadeem.

[johninderby]

As I said, i've gone for a moonlight, no worries with what amount it would take.

Nadeem.

Should have gone for a Feather Touch rack & pinion. :D

John

[Deneb]

LOL, Saving for the FeatherTouch for another scope...

[johninderby]

LOL, Saving for the FeatherTouch for another scope...

*** Warning ***

Once you got used to an FT R&P even a Moonlite or any other crayford suffers in comparison. It's just the effortless way it handles any amount of weight as well as the smoothness.

John

[FLO]

We have currently sold out of Baader Steeltrack RT focusers (the one for refractors) but hope to have more arriving next week.

So far the feedback has been excellent (Nadeem's being the only return)

Regarding the use of nylon/Delrin/whatever grub-screws. Baader, inline with most other manufacturers, use them because the sound of metal against metal is enough to set your teeth on edge. Metal scraping together can also create metal dust which if it falls into the optic is not desirable. Even Moonlite put polymer tips on the edge of their metal grub-screws.

Should have gone for a Feather Touch rack & pinion. :D

Baader Steeltrack RT : £239

Moonlite CF : £355

Feathertouch : Not sure but I am guessing more expensive than Moonlite.

Horses for courses

Steve

[Mak One]

Steve gave me a guided tour of one of these yesterday. Very, very nice kit. Order placed.

[blinky]

I have A steeltrack and its ok but tbh my fav focuser was the WO linear power focused which was a Crawford but with a linear ball race in it, this has zero slop thanks to the ball race and the fine motion due to it being a Crawford - best of both worlds! I got the steeltrack as it was a straight swap for the focuser on my GSO newt but overall I'm not a fan of the Crawford design, especially when used with heavy imaging kit.

[FLO]

I have A steeltrack and its ok but tbh my fav focuser was the WO linear power focused which was a Crawford but with a linear ball race in it, this has zero slop thanks to the ball race and the fine motion due to it being a Crawford - best of both worlds! I got the steeltrack as it was a straight swap for the focuser on my GSO newt but overall I'm not a fan of the Crawford design, especially when used with heavy imaging kit.

I agree. We were disappointed when WO dropped the Linear Power focuser. To be fair, the Crayford DDG is very successful on smaller scopes like the M72 but not the larger FLT models. Fortunately they will soon be upgraded to a new R&P DDG focuser. We will be receiving some William Optics FLT-132 LZOS triplets soon with the new-style focuser (and some fitted with Feathertouch). I don't want to tempt fate but we are being advised the new WO R&P is an entirely new design that sits somewhere between a Moonlite and Feathertouch... We'll know more soon.

Steve

[FLO]

Is there one for the Lunt FS60 solarscope? the original has become a bit of a pain.

Olly

We don't handle Lunt scopes Olly so I don't know (Ian King is a Lunt dealer, he might know).

Olly, someone just ordered a Baader ClickLock eyepiece adapter saying it was for a Lunt telescope. I don't know which model but thought it might be useful to you.

ATB,

Steve

[johninderby]

Is there one for the Lunt FS60 solarscope? the original has become a bit of a pain.

Olly

Olly, have you seen this adaptor for fitting a Feather Touch to a Lunt60?

Adapter for all LS60T H-alpha and CaK telescopes with normal crayford style focuser, to change the crayford focuser to a Starlight Instruments 2" Feather Touch focuser with 1.5" travel.

=24&cHash=0006fbb587"]http://www.lunt-solarsystems.eu/index.php?id=22&L=1&tx_commerce_pi1[catUid]=24&cHash=0006fbb587

John

John

[Rossco72]

Olly, someone just ordered a Baader ClickLock eyepiece adapter saying it was for a Lunt telescope. I don't know which model but thought it might be useful to you.

ATB,

Steve

Olly,

That would be me!

It screws onto the blocking filter and allows 1.25" accessories and cameras to be attached and has a 4mm micro focuser included with very small adjustments available.

And that's on top of having a Feathertouch on my Lunt, I am greedy:D:D:D

Cheers

[Deneb]

Sometimes im too darn fussy, but once you've had a few moonlites, other focusers never feel the same !

A nice orange moonlite is sitting on my Skywatcher ED80 DS Pro now, it looks a lot more impressive then the Baader.

[Tim]

The moonlites ARE nice, that is for sure, but do take care to rotate the focuser regularly. I have one for my C9.25 and it got clicky from having worn flats on the spindle through not being used enough.

[Mak One]

For all Skywatcher MAK users: BEWARE - the statement about the SCT-MAK adaptor on FLO's website is incorrect. It does not fit all the Skywatcher MAK's - certainly not the newer 150 Pro's with the 2" visual back. This means the nice Baader Steeltrack won't fit.

First pic is the back of the 150 with the 2" diagonal adaptor in place:

Second pic shows the back with the diagonal adapter removed:

Note the dimensions. No idea if anyone has produced a suitable SCT adapter for these dims yet. If not, newer MAK users are stuck with moving the mirror for focus.

[FLO]

You are right, Skywatcher have changed the thread on some of thier Maksutov models so the product description is out of date, it only works with earlier models. To be fair we did replace the price with a 'call' notice to prevent anyone ordering it in error (the only UK dealer to have done so).

I understood Skywatcher have changed thier Maksutov threads to regular SCT threads so the Baader Steeltraks and other SCT fitting focusers would screw straight on. Perhaps this is not the case or they might have made another change.

When we know what Skywatcher have done and which models are affected we'll update the product description and make the adapter available again.

Hope that helps

[Mak One]

Thanks. To be fair, the descriptions of the adaptor on the Green Witch and Scopes'n'Skies websites also don't take account of this anomaly, so you're not alone.

PM sent.

[Luke]

We've just received one of these to go on our SW ED100 Pro. Very nice!

It's our second one to go with the one on our ED80 that we've been using for over a year.

I like the markings down the barrel to help you get the focus in the right area for future sessions.

It's slightly lower profile than the original ED100 focuser, so no loss of inwards travel

The lock works fine for me, we've hung a fair bit of weight off the back of the first one with a 2x powermate and 450D, with no worries at all.

We really like our moonlite on another scope as well, but the Baader costs less. We're chuffed with both!

[iwatkins]

Any options yet to fit a Steeltrack or even a Moonlite to the larger visual back of the Skywatcher 150 or 180 Mak?

I'm doing a lot of imaging with my 180 Mak and could really do with a fine focus control that can take some weight.

Cheers

Ian

[cowasaki]

So no option to fit it to a MAK 180?