Mesu Musings,

[ampleamp]

For some time I have been looking at getting a higher capacity mount than my EQ6 . In a year that promises some choices, few have yet to make it into production which doesn't help as I either had to wait for an infrequent second hand biggy, or spend many more ££ than perhaps I wanted.

Step up the Mesu 200.

I had a trip down to see Bernard at Modern Astronomy on Friday and came away with my new Mesu - what a beast!! Bernard went through the basics with me, and then provided me with a very good tea before my journey back home. Thanks to him for that as it made setup much easier.

Due to other commitments, I didn't get chance to even take it out the car until yesterday afternoon. Happily the Mesu has the same size lower fixing bolt as the EQ6 and with the provided pier plate adapter, the Mesu sat right onto the existing post.

Connection is dead easy, everything is essentially plug and play. The only slightly tricky bit was making sure the Argo Navis spoke to the ServoCat, but when you follow the instructions, this is straight forwards ;-)).

Olly P. has mentioned that he aligns on one star then moves to the target of his choice and that it is dead centre of the chip every time. Happily, that is exactly what happened for me.

By now I was very tired and decided to quit while I was ahead. There is a tremendous amount to learn with the Argo Navis system and I am not going to break it in one sitting however it is my intention to keep chipping away over the summer months; maybe it will be easier to do it all through a pc?.

I know that there aren't many of these mounts around as yet, but I think that this situation will change. The above is in no way a review, merely some initial thoughts. A full review will follow when I am more comfortable with the system, and that will be work dependent as i am often busy at night and weekends (which always seems to coincide with clear nights!). Suffice to say that so far, this appears to be an extremely solid mount, and as someone said, I am now over-mounted!

For anyone interested, Bernard has more in stock at the moment. I'm sure he would be keen to speak to you!

[JamesF]

The downside, I guess, being that it's more tricky to operate the scope without the arm and leg you have to leave behind at the shop...

(Not that I'm saying it isn't good value, but ouch!)

James

[Earl]

The downside, I guess, being that it's more tricky to operate the scope without the arm and leg you have to leave behind at the shop...

(Not that I'm saying it isn't good value, but ouch!)

James

If it was red it would be boths arms and legs

Im serioulsy tempted on one of these next year.

[Marmite]

Awesome! And those look a lot like Sky-Watcher counterweights but with a bigger central hole.

[ampleamp]

Not exactly cheap I will concede, but with a capacity and an apparent out of the box performance similar to AP or Paramount, at considerably less ££, what isn't to like? ;-))

Yes, these are SW weights, with a 40mm hole drilled through them. I have these for now, and so I can get going. There are some stainless weights coming which will be more aesthetically pleasing but function is higher on my list. Also missing is a polar scope, which although not absolutely necessary, I wanted. Otherwise, this is the complete deal.

[ollypenrice]

Reveiwing stuff is a nightmare on just one count: suppose you praise a product that then lets somebody down? I gave this a positive review in Astronomy Technology Today and Yves' Mesu 200, which lives here, continues to please. I'm delighted that your initial reactions are favourable. Keep us posted.

This mount undercuts the competition on price by a margin very, very rarely seen in astronomy.

[Jessun]

What a great setup there!

The MESU is all in all a deal hard to beat it seems.

I noticed you have what looks like an Altair Astro saddle plate clamp with a custom bolt; how did you manage to the the supplied bolt out??

I know it will be nice to see the resulting images!

[Black Knight]

Congrats, it certainly does look a great mount. I think I'm going to need a slightly larger piggy-bank for that one!

[steppenwolf]

I have one of these in my sights so I will be very interested to hear how you get on with it. It certainly looks the business.

[ncjunk]

Have you got a picture of how you attached it too the pier?

and what saddle does it come with?

I have a pier with an EQ6 on it at present so need to figure out what I need to do to swap it over.

I should be getting one from Bern

at the start of July as long as I get no monetry surprises between now and then ;-)

...I can´t wait!

[ampleamp]

Hi Neil,

my pier had an EQ6 on it. As said above, you can more or less swop them over as both mounts use the same sized M12 bolt although I had a slight adaptation due to the extra depth of a pier top - see attached pic. For info, the mount's base is 20cm diameter, the pier top (supplied by Mesu) is 27cm diameter, and my pier adapter/leveller is 15cm diameter. What I have done for now is use a long M12 bolt cut so that it is 25mm above the level of the pier top (with judicious use of washers below to allow easy tightening). As part of the package from Bern, I also got a Mesu-made tripod and 25mm is the length of this thread. If you were not to use a pier top and go straight onto an adapter, I would still use 25mm.

This seems very secure but I will tidy up the base with a better bolt and I also intend to spot weld around the adapter and bottom of the pier top for added security (I never like just one anchor point).

The second pic is more just to show the diameter differences. The servo cat should screw into the two small silver bolts on the mount base, but having a pier top means that box will not reach hence the cable ties - at least an improvement on the bit of string I used previously.

re the saddle, mine has come with an Altair Astro Losmandy type saddle, again supplied as part of the package by Mesu; all I stipulated was that it was to be Losmandy and be capable of holding an ADM dual bar. Underneath, there are plenty attachment holes, and a central peg, for various options. It seems and saddle will be flush with the mount so I couldn't use my ADM Losmandy saddle.

Hope this answers your questions, if you want any more pics/info, give me a shout and i will try to answer them,

Alistair

[MartinB]

Good luck with the Mesu Alistair, the specs are certainly excellent. Is it Ascom compliant and does it have any decent drivers? Also, can it track far beyond the meridian?

[ampleamp]

Martin, I haven't used anything other than the Argo Navis handset as yet but on reading the manual, ascom is mentioned and I would think that ascom would provide the link to software such as CDC/Stellarium etc. AN is rated very highly, especially amongst the iceinspace lot, and for now I am only going to be using the handset(s) provided which will be a bit of a change coming from the Eqmod/CDC combination. re tracking beyond meridian, it is either 2 or 3 hours dependant on who you speak to; due to weather issues in Shropshire, I haven't even come close to the opportunity to try it. Perhaps Olly would know as he has a lot of hours use under his belt.

[ncjunk]

Thanks Alistair thats perfect.

So hopefully in will slot straight on top of the old one

[Earl]

The more I read the more I want..

This one is going to take some serious saving though.

[Stephen]

The more I read the more I want..

This one is going to take some serious saving though.

Lottery win more like for me

[Odd Thomas]

Very, very nice. One can only dream!

[ollypenrice]

I find it tracks beyond the Meridian until it either approaches a collision or it starts to image the warm room roof! There is no fall off in guiding accuracy. I don't know if there is a theoretical limit but I find, in practice, that you don't encounter any other limits than environmental ones. Three hours or so is the norm for me.

Lucas Mesu does, of course, do a big flipless fork mount variant which would be very nice (wouldn't it, Yves??) because Olly could get more sleep and look younger and more beautiful as a result...

By the way, collisions trigger an overload cutoff so don't need to the extreme caution required by some systems.

Olly

[ampleamp]

I have had a couple of queries re the tripod and portability;

the tripod is essentially a pier on top of a wing footed tripod. The one I have is a metre long and makes for comfortable use - actually I just measured it and the tripod stands 108cm at the flat top. The feet are 70cm apart. I see Bern has now updated his website photo with the one I played with when visiting him. It is shorter, maybe 40-50cm(??).

re portability, hmmmm, not really, this is more suited as an observatory mount. At a guess, the mount body is approx 20-25kg, so a reasonable lift for many people. The mount, counterweight bar etc all come in a fitted wooden/cardboard box but this took two people to comfortably carry it any distance. It easily fits in an estate boot.

The tripod is approx 10-12kg so not too bad, however it is bulky in the sense that I drive a Forester estate and the tripod only just fitted into the back seat and took a little persuasion.

Having said that, I did get the tripod with the intention that my car would be big enough to carry it and that I would be prepared to travel with the entire system. I don't think there would be too much trouble if I dropped the back seat.

You will have to ignore the debris in the shed; I haven't as yet used the tripod so it is better staying in its wrap.

[Martin-Devon]

Chris thanks very much for this update & the photos. Interesting to see that the Mesu2 will actually go on a "standard" looking portable pier since some of the pics on other websites show the Mesu sitting just about 1 foot off the ground on a quite odd looking arrangement! We'll all be very keen to hear your feedback on its performance in your hands, especially it's tracking & guiding accuracy. Olly & Yves have previously raised the bar so to speak in terms of expectations of what this mount can do, and they've certainly derived excellent images with it in their hands, so it will be important now to hear feedback similarly from other users like yourself.

Regards, Martin

[MartinB]

Martin, I haven't used anything other than the Argo Navis handset as yet but on reading the manual, ascom is mentioned and I would think that ascom would provide the link to software such as CDC/Stellarium etc. AN is rated very highly, especially amongst the iceinspace lot, and for now I am only going to be using the handset(s) provided which will be a bit of a change coming from the Eqmod/CDC combination. re tracking beyond meridian, it is either 2 or 3 hours dependant on who you speak to; due to weather issues in Shropshire, I haven't even come close to the opportunity to try it. Perhaps Olly would know as he has a lot of hours use under his belt.

Thanks Alistair. I understand the Paramount wont go beyond the meridian although it will do an automated flip to bring it bang on to where it was before (apart from being upside down!). This wouldn't work for me unless I spent more ££££s automating my dome. With a well engineered mount tracking issues more or less disappear although, believe me, you will have bad nights and you will fret about the Mesu and start to question it. Over time you realise there is far more to mess up the guiding that the tracking ability of the mount!! From time to time I have cast dark looks towards my EM200 and yet every time the problem has been else where (seeing, over saturated guide star, maxim switching between 2 guide stars, cable wrap, flex etc etc). Having absolute confidence in the mount makes life a lot easier The software set up is critical to imaging happiness especially if you plan to operate remotely. I don't know anything about the Argo Navis software, can you access it via a laptop? Brilliant if you can. I know Olly likes to keep computer dependency to a minimum but I don't like being tied to a handset. The Mesu looks like a fantastic mount and I am really interested in hearing how you get on

Lucas Mesu does, of course, do a big flipless fork mount variant which would be very nice (wouldn't it, Yves??) because Olly could get more sleep and look younger and more beautiful as a result...

That's just not going to happen is it Olly

[Martin-Devon]

Alistair - apologies I referred to you as "Chris" in my earlier post this morning!

[ollypenrice]

Martin, I think you were looking at the strange looking original Mesu Number One which is an entirely different mount, though still roller drive. The strange red mount is a variation on a fork, though it is not actually forked... It's flipless.

Olly

[MartinB]

Martin, I think you were looking at the strange looking original Mesu Number One which is an entirely different mount, though still roller drive. The strange red mount is a variation on a fork, though it is not actually forked... It's flipless.

Olly

Still not going to make you look young and beautiful though Olly

[ncjunk]

Still not going to make you look young and beautiful though Olly

Surely there is an expensive filter that can do that?

I saw a pic of the other mesu mount and i think it was using two telescopes that balanced each other out so no need for counter weights....its a little bit more eaxpensive...but flipless!