DIY tripod for SW AZ3

[Patrice Lanteigne]

When I bought my ED100 it came with a Skywatcher AZ3 mount and tripod. The tripod legs were extendable thin wall bent aluminum, as in low cost photo tripods. Although the mount is far from a top shelf example of an Alt/Azm it is nevertheless a handy little mount for terrestrial use. However once the legs were extended to a useable height the whole thing was essentially unusable.

My solution was to remove the factory legs from the mount and replace them with shop made oak legs. The mount is epoxied onto square oak pegs built into the top of the legs. Of course these are not extendable but I didn't need them to be as they are mostly for terrestrial use of my ED100.

(Excuse the low quality iPhone photo.)

[Maka_Nui]

Nothing fancy here. Just a good sturdy tripod and you can always adapt it to your needs. Should last decades. Good job...

Aloha...

Maka

[nightfisher]

Nice tripod Patrice

[Catweazel]

Nice work! Looks very solid

[JamesF]

It does indeed look very nice. I happen to have some offcuts of oak in the workshop, and an AZ3. Hmmm...

James