My Pier

[gajjer]

Hi guys. Thought I'd share the pictures of my pier. Only used it once so far but the results are encouraging.

Its a 6 foot steel pipe, 6 inches dia with a 0.5 inch wall thickness. That may sound heavy but I got it at a good price. It also meant I could drill and tap M6 to take the top plate. The ends were cut pretty square so no finishing required.

The bottom plate was drilled together with the top plate to take 3 dowels that would allow alignment. I intend removing the top plate with the mount regularly. The top plate screws onto the bottom plate with three M6 screws and the plates are seperated with 12mm spacers. The plates are not perfectly level but near enough.

There is a plug sticking out the bottom of the mount unfortunately so the mount is attached to the top plate with a hefty spacer in between. There is a peg sticking up from the spacer that is positioned so that it is in between the adjuster screws of the mount. The bottom of the spacer is glued to the bottom plate, so it stays still when the adjustment L/R is made.

One thing I found was that the bottom surface of the mount that bears on the spacer was painted. I found that the casting also had some 'dinks' in it that made it rock slightly. I leveled that off by glueing a piece of emery to the bearing face of the spacer and cut a hole so the mount plug would go through. Its a lot better now.

I will now attempt to attch photos!!

[Bizibilder]

Thata a very impressive looking pier.

[Damo636]

Very impressive indeed!

[gajjer]

Thanks guys. I'm hoping the dowling arrangement will allow me to remove the top with the mount and then precisely reposition it.

Time will tell. Like all my projects, no sooner have I finished them - the clouds come in. Rats!!!!

gaj

[r3i]

Nice job - looks very professional.

[ollypenrice]

So you can take the mount head indoors and then set it up again with no aligning? That has to be a good system.

Olly

[RogerTheDodger]

I take mine off the pier when I pack up, PA is still darned accurate when I put it back on.

[gajjer]

Thanks for all the kind comments.

Living in the UK I did not like the idea of leaving the mount in situ. Also didn't like the idea of adjustment bolts.

So the doweling arrangment came to mind. Originally it was going to be top plate straight onto bottom plate but

there were a couple of issues with that, so I settled with the fairly big spacers. In the summer months I may return to

the lathe and trim them up a bit. The main thing at present is proof of concept and to see how good I can get the mount.

Its only a EQ3-2 and a bit overloaded. I'm not guiding.

Initial results look better than anything I have done to date and my back is all the better for it too!! ( Lugging tripod about )

I'm still new to all this and have a long way to go. The timer I designed is the next thing for modding. It only allows up to

3mins so now I have to reprogram it for longer durations.

I'll post some results when I'm happy with them.

cheers

gaj