Goto mounts

[MJP]

I have a Celestron XLT 120mm refractor on the supplied non powered mount.

I would like a goto mount for this scope. The main reason is that many of the things I want to see (including Neptune) cannot be seen with the naked eye from my suburban garden. It is therefore very hit and miss, time consuming and frustrating trying to locate the object.

I had thought about a Skywatchers EQ5 goto mount which is reasonably priced. In my garden i can set up marked points to polar align the scope. My main concern, however, is that if I take this mount to one of the dark(er) sky sites I might spend half the evening polar aligning it.

An alternative might be an Alt/Az goto but I have not been able to identify one which would both meet my needs and budget.

Any advice on (a) Skywatcher's EQ5 goto, ( Alt/Az goto mounts, and © mounts in general will be really helpful.

Many thanks

Mike

[Jiggy 67]

I have the EQ5 GoTo and it's a very good mount. Unless you plan to take photos I wouldn't worry too much about polar aligning. All I ever do is get Polaris in the centre of my polar scope and then do a 2 or 3 star align. I have not needed to be bang on with polar aligning

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[mallorcasaint]

Thew CG5 is a great mount and has the advantage of very sturdy 2" tripod legs.

[Tinker1947]

Polar aligning doesn't need to be spot on unless your doing images ect...

[SeedyF]

Having just got a goto after 7 years of star hopping I can tell you it is great for light polluted areas. I have been able to see faint objects I would really struggle to locate. Mine is Alt/Az as it's on a dob. Its a doddle to set up and although I have a marked area for it it only needs rough north alignment so that shouldn't be an issue.

[Capricorn]

If it is for visual use only the polar alignment doesn't have to be perfect. What you want is for it to be reasonable enough to get the object in view (long focal length eyepiece) and keep it there for sufficent time to observe it.

You can always tweek the object into the centre and there is a PAE (something like that) option to take the latest position as the reference position. So the errors do not constantly increase.

[aussi skywatcher]

Hi, I have a Vixen Skypod alt az mount, it took a while to find my way around it but once you have learnt to recognise which button you are pressing (in the dark) and what it does its a breeze. I have tracked objects for hours at a time and they have stayed dead centre. The downside is battery life - it chews them (12x AA) - I have a power tank which powers the mount (12volt) and have recently altered the wiring on the starbook (computer) and invested in a 12volt to 6 volt adapter so now the whole thing runs off the power tank. I had concerns initially but love it now - hope this helps. cheers Paul