Cable Managment -- I'd had enough!!!!

[Mav359]

Whilst at Six Penny Handley a few weeks back i set my scope up and not having a system for the cables it looked like several spiders and an octopus had had an acciedent involving a blender, needless to say it was a mess so i stripped it down and went again and although it was better it still wasn't great & so when i got back i thought i needed a repeatable solution that was modular, i wanted to be able to take the scope, mount & tripod apart & leave as much in place as possible I also wanted a soloution that could be repeated over and over again. So i did the following.....

Firstly i wanted to mount the CCD power box & the dew controller somewhere where they were out of the way but close enough to the OTA that the cables werent understrain and secondly so that the cables protruding from them were snagging on the scope or mount all the time, previously i had them cable tied to the tripod legs or sitting on the eyepiece tray neither which worked well. On the celestron CGEM mount there is a 1" hole through the mount so i used it and made a mounting bracket for both boxes, like so

 I then colour coded each leg as a reference point and any cables in that leg are cable tied together using the same coloured ties. To each tripod leg i attached a length of 30mm x 16mm D-Line trunking to run any cables through.  The red leg houses the power for the mount and the dew controller, the blue leg houses the USB Hub power, its USB cable & the yellow leg will house the camera cables. These cable items will permantly remain on the tripod, cables such as the power for the mount once detached falls back to the relevant leg and a velcro strap holds it in place for transport. Each leg will also house an "arm of my LED Feet" mod which i will document seperatly.

The hand controller connects at 2 points, the Hand Controller port on the mount and the USB hub for computer control, these including the handcontroller and its bracket i will remove from the mount for travel.

As the cables exit the trunking at the top of the tripod they enter the domain of the mount, upto the point of the mount where the RA Axis starts i have used loads of small plastic self adhisive clips which the cables solt in and out of, these cables drop back down away from the mount to their respective leg for disassembly.

The point at which the power for the mount and the hand controller meet they attach the mount below RA and then leave the mount before returning to clips on the mount faceplate leaving enough slack fo the scope to rotate fully in RA in both directions without snagging on anything.

Thats it for the moment, my OTA & camera is away so there is more to do.

.his may not be much use to anyone, maybe it'll give someone some ideas, what it has given me is a system of cabling that is repeatable and thus saving on the setup time.

Cheers

[Tinker1947]

I used a dowel with a hole bore through the middle then split cables placed inside and the 2 pieces of wood taped back together, then 2 terry clips pop riveted together, one clipped on the tripod leg the other help the piecs of dowel, a couple of these one at the top and the other at the bottom of a tripod leg, self amalgamating tape done a good job...

[Mav359]

Ive also modded the dew controller so that the cable can be removed and added usb dongle extensions to the hub to stop any movement and disconnting taking place on the hub

[Nibor]

Thanks for sharing your cable management system - I am working on my system as well - and any ideas are welcome!!

Like you I find Velcro a very handy product!!

The self adhesive clips (palm of hand) look quite handy, as does the trunking for the legs, can you tell me where you got them from??

Many thanks

[Mav359]

The trunking is D-Line, i bought from TLC in this size but there are larger and smaller availble, i wouldn't go any bigger though

http://www.tlc-direct.co.uk/Main_Index/Trunking_Pvc_Index/Dline_Black_Index/Dline_30_15_Black/index.html

as for the clips i ordered them of amazon, this is the link i used but the ones that turned up are slightly different although i reckon better, the sticky pads they come are quite qood as well.

http://www.amazon.co.uk/gp/product/B00B26H3Q0/ref=oh_details_o01_s00_i00?ie=UTF8&psc=1

My only idea throughout was to keep it modular, there was cable for the tripod, cable for the mount & there will be for the OTA. They have to obviosly overlap sections but when i took the scope apart i wanted a way not to have to take the cabling apart and start again each time.

[kriss13]

I trimmed all my cables (dews, power etc) to the length needed for my specific setup, too.

Afterwards looking at the needles pile of cables left after trimming... 70% of useless cables... my stash for next 10 years if i need some.

Everything is clean and tight now.

I don't even need the cable clips.. but is a nice extra

[Mav359]

i went with the clips because the cables from the tripods will always return to this exact setup each time, once i need to move the rig those cables fall away to the tripod legs and are velcroed in place for transport.

[Macavity]

Infuruating, innit? More so, since I'm trying to ensure that nothing gets tangled or "stretched" during remote operation. HEQ5 power and control seem in little danger of tangling now... Mostly a question of cutting to right length, attaching them to the mount... AND sending the cables off in the right direction initially! Random cables, I tend to dangle over the counter-weight bar. I provide CCTV monitoring, but suspect I will need (at first) to be present when performing meridian flips!

For non "mission critical" critical cables (with no real current) I use 3.5mm jacks - sockets,

either static or inline to the cable. The cable can then "break" if subjected to a *real* tug.   

[Mav359]

For non "mission critical" critical cables (with no real current) I use 3.5mm jacks - sockets,

either static or inline to the cable. The cable can then "break" if subjected to a *real* tug.   

That was the idea of the USB dongle extension cables of the hub, i broke my first 1000d because of that

[Nibor]

The trunking is D-Line, i bought from TLC in this size but there are larger and smaller availble, i wouldn't go any bigger though

http://www.tlc-direct.co.uk/Main_Index/Trunking_Pvc_Index/Dline_Black_Index/Dline_30_15_Black/index.html

as for the clips i ordered them of amazon, this is the link i used but the ones that turned up are slightly different although i reckon better, the sticky pads they come are quite qood as well.

http://www.amazon.co.uk/gp/product/B00B26H3Q0/ref=oh_details_o01_s00_i00?ie=UTF8&psc=1

My only idea throughout was to keep it modular, there was cable for the tripod, cable for the mount & there will be for the OTA. They have to obviosly overlap sections but when i took the scope apart i wanted a way not to have to take the cabling apart and start again each time.

Alan,

Many thanks for the links.

Robin