anyone tried a Fornax 51

[ampleamp]

My search for an increased capacity mount continues with another possibility to my list; is anyone using a Fornax 51 mount? A search on here doesn't produce any hits so I suspect not, but a mount with a capacity of 40-50Kgs, is Eqmod compatible, , and has a quoted pe of 7 arcseconds - correctable to <1 arcsecond with TDM - surely has to worthy of looking at.

I have so far only found a couple of Germans and Hungarians that have this mount - they seem very happy, but if anyone here can tell me anything, I am all ears.

thanks

[perfrej]

Been around this path myself for a while and finally settled on 10Micron GM2000HPS. Things to look for, in my humble opinion, are:

- Load (of course) should be around 40-50 kg

- Some portability

- Decent software and an ASCOM driver

- Absolute encoders (loosen frictions, fiddle - not lost!)

- Low PE, means belts/worm or straight friction

Miss anything?

The one I found has:

- Slew of 20°/s

- Belt and worm

- 1 arcsec tracking accurace over 15 minutes (guiding? Probably not necessary)

- Splittable for portability

- ASCOM driver

- Satellite tracking from 5° below horizon

http://10micron.com or Baader's site.

/per

[Grinde]

Been around this path myself for a while and finally settled on 10Micron GM2000HPS.

/per

I went for the GM2000HPS too, first light two days ago, I'm very very impressed after seeing perfectly round stars in my 20min unguided subs.

[ampleamp]

Thanks guys, looks like a fabulous mount but at €12500 - €16000 too rich for my blood. However, if the blurb is accurate, a mightily impressive mount. Also, my German is poorly adequate so don't fully understand the variations.

I didn't expect much response on the Fornax having seen only a few references to it on Google. Perhaps I will be sticking to the original thoughts of Mesu/Gemini or possibly even the new Paramount MX.

[Grinde]

Have you looked at the Gemini G53F or the Mesu Mount 2? Both friction-drives with high payload capability without costing that much.

[ampleamp]

Hi Jonas,

These are the two on the list although there seems to be some availability issues at the moment. I am waiting to hear about them, hopefully get some news in the next couple of weeks as I could do with sorting this before the end of March.

[Erebus]

I hope they have some G53's in by the summer . Ive spent best part of the last year deciding which mount to get .