It's Arrived, Oh Yesssss!

[ccdscopeman]

The beast has arrived, minus the forklift truck,lol.

I can't believe how much mount you get for the money when I consider the Sphinx that I just sold retails at one and a half times the price of the NEQ6 Pro, plus the payload maximum was under half that of this beauty.

Unpacking the tripod was very reminiscent of my old 10" LX200 tripod, this one the legs I think is a little beefier in diameter by a small amount. I know why they put the pointy bits on the feet of the tripod legs, which is great for soft ground, but I often wonder when used on a solid surface like a patio how much this could affect stability or more so vibration dampening time if the tripod is accidentally knocked in the dark? But then maybe the entire weight of the whole set up is enough to counter act this enough. It always looks like a lot of heavy expensive gear teetering on three little pointy bits to me

Unpacking the mount itself, well, what can I say that hasn't already been said before? Humongous is one word for it, really quite heavy (remember the Sphinx was a hell of a lot lighter), but certainly not unliftable. I always feel weary about removing a mount for the first time out of its box, it always feels so awkward, anyway, counted to ten, up and out onto the sofa. What a lovely piece of kit, a nice touch too was the inclusion of the SynScan hand controller holder, with the few mounts I've had, somewhere to put the hand controller has always been a big niggle for me (no rude replies here please,lol) that seems to get overlooked by most manufacturers.

Right, I'm off now after levelling the tripod to go and hook up the mount, Azimuth adjusters both undone in readiness, double hernia here I come.

Andy.

[dtr42]

double hernia here I come

is that in the orion nebula ??

cracking piece of kit wish you clear skie's and dark nights

[ollypenrice]

Good news.

Lucas Mesu does a nice freestanding little tripod-pier device to hold the handset. You can put it where you like. A brilliant idea.

Olly

[ccdscopeman]

Ha, ha, very good dtr42! I thought it was in Gemini, lol.

Olly, are you serious? Do you have a link? )

Andy

[ollypenrice]

Perfectly serious. I have one in our main observatory;

I don't know if Mesu Optics will sell them separately but you could easily make one. Believe me, they are great!

Olly

[Auntystatic]

You think its heavy now, wait until you have to put 2 more weights on it lol

[iwatkins]

... And a 6" frac + wedge + camera

And that black cloud you thought would pass is actually a hailstorm

(been known to run with close to 45kg of kit in a waddling fashion back into the house like this).

It's a great mount, treat it well and it'll look after you. Only advice? Replace the altitude bolts now, before they bend.

Cheers

Ian

[JamesF]

Wasn't there some conclusion reached that all but fine-tuning the mount adjustment should be done without weights or scope to minimise the load on the bolts?

James

[sloz1664]

Hi Andy,

Don't worry about the "little pointy feet". Once you get a payload on it it won't budge. I certainly agree in getting the the beefier alt bolts as Ian suggests. EQ6 yahoo site is a good place to start.

Steve

[FLO]

I can't believe how much mount you get for the money when I consider the Sphinx that I just sold retails at one and a half times the price of the NEQ6 Pro, plus the payload maximum was under half that of this beauty.

It doesn't work that way in practice. Vixen under-estimate their mounts payloads and Skywatcher over estimate theirs. Also, through clever design the Vixen needs less in the way of counterweights to balance the same OTA. There are pros and cons for both mounts

HTH,

Steve

[michael.h.f.wilkinson]

I can attest to the solid nature of Vixen mounts. Even their "lightweight" Great Polaris is a beast in terms of what it can really carry, as opposed to what Vixen says (7 kg). They are often considered the equivalent of an EQ5 Pro, which I have seen rated at 10-13kg or so.

[John]

Get inside a Vixen and look at the quality of the machining compared to Skywatcher. The Skywatcher products are great value but even a non-engineer like myself can see what you are paying for with a Vixen mount. It's the same with the scopes - the R&P focuser on my Vixen ED102SS looks superficially like a standard Skywatcher R&P but inside it the quality of machining and fit is top class.

[ccdscopeman]

Thanks everyone, alt adjusters are on the way. Love the handset holder Olly, I thought after I asked you for the link that you might have been on a wind up, so I do apologise. lol. I'm off to look into the EQ6 Yahoo group.

Andy