Dovetail bar, or something else?

[Mark Henthorne]

Good morning All,

I have a Sky-Watcher Evostar-120 with the original 13 inch / 33.5cm dovetail bar and tube rings. To mount items on top of this, I could simply obtain another matching dovetail bar, but is this the right way to go? Are there alternatives that I should give consideration to, and why?

Thanks for any info in advance.

Mark

[Bizibilder]

I have, in the past, mounted a guide scope by simply getting a piece of aluminium bar (50mmx6mm I think) and drilling a few holes in it in the appropriate places. This was then bolted to the scope rings (using the "camera mount" holes in the tops of the rings) and the guide scope rings bolted to my bar. Total cost was zero as I had scrounged the ali bar many years ago and it had been "in stock" ever since. You can buy ali bar from various metal suppliers for quite a bit less than a commercial dovetail!

[Mark Henthorne]

Hi Bizibilder,

Many thanks for your valued input. I'd wondered about using aluminium bar as a cheaper option to a dovetail, particularly as I was unsure whether the dovetail aspect was in any way required for anything other than that which can be achieved using your aluminium bar approach.

At the moment, the only merit I can see in utilising a dovetail bar is that I could re-use that later with suitable tube rings on my 8" Meade LX50 as and when the electrics die on that mount. From everything I read about the LX50, it seems to be a common scenario, so perhaps that might be the way to go.

Regards,

Mark