Skywatcher mounts

[frugal]

Whenever someone asks about mounts for imaging, the reaponse invariably seems to come back "HEQ5 is the minimum". I was wondering why the skywatcher mount is alway mentioned as opposed to any of the mounts from Vixen or Celestron?

Is the SkyWatcher just better bang for your buck? Is there an assumption that beginners will be using a SkyWatcher scope and therefore a guaranteed compatible mount is being recomended? Are SkyWatcher mounts the only mounts that are any good for astrophotograhy?

Lots of people seem to be using Celestron mounts and even the FLO website indicates that the Celestron mounts are just like the SkyWatcher ones but with better bearings, so I am wondering why they are not recommended more. Do they have a down side that means thay are not much cop?

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[ollypenrice]

There is no issue of compatibility. A mount is a mount. You have to pick one which will 1) carry the intended weight and 2) track at the focal length (or pixel scale) that you have in mind. Be aware that on forums there is far more talk about '1' then '2' but both are utterly essential. The idea that Mount X can carry a Celestron C14's weight therefore Mount X is fine for a C14 is utterly crazy. A C14 has a focal length of 3.9 metres which means it will need an extraterrestrial tracking precision... Don't expect to pay less than about £7K.

SW versus Celestron? Not a clue. I use SW mounts, Takahashi and Mesu. The SW and Celestron come out of the same factories, so we are told, so does it matter? I don't know. Celestron do a fancy version of the NEQ6 which didn't strike me as a useful improvement. I'll stand corrected.

Olly

http://ollypenrice.smugmug.com/Other/Best-of-Les-Granges/22435624_WLMPTM#!i=2277139556&k=FGgG233

Edit. If I tried to use a ) and b ) without the spaces I got a face. I changed to 1) and 2). Scandalous! 

[iksose7]

I think the reason most people for for Skywatcher is becasue they have a large customer base. So if you were to have a problem, chances are someone has already had it and you can find the solution no problem on forums. 

I'm not sure about Celestron, but i know Orion mounts are from the same factory as Skywatcher and i think you are right about Celestron having slightly upgraded parts. I'm not sure about Vixen! I was put off them for some reason even though i know some of their mounts are great.  

Some of the best imagers i know of use HEQ5s so the only reason i would go for anything over that is depending on what scopes you want to put on it down the road. When i was choosing a mount, i went for the SW NEQ6. I did really fancy that sexy black Celestron CGEM but it comes down to saving a couple hundred pounds, and that £200 could go towards hyper tuning the mount at some point. The NEQ6 will do just fine for what i plan to eventually put on it

[ollypenrice]

Vixen made great mounts a long time ago and then got themselves in a rare old mess with software. I don't know anybody who hasn't got totally fed up with the various incarnations of the Sphinx and moved on. Please note, I don't claim to know everybody!

Olly

[poogle]

I also think it is due to their large customer base here in Europe. Plus their mounts have been around for quite some time. I went for the new Celestron AVX (almost identical performance specs as the HEQ5 mount) when upgrading my SW EQ3-2, mainly due to the crappy alt/az bolts on the Skywatcher mounts and me favouring the Celestron hand controller over the SW one. Really minor things, and maybe a bold move since it always is a bit of a gamble buying new "untested" products. But so far I'm very pleased with how the mount performs for me

[frugal]

Rats, That means that when I save up enough money for a proper mount the choice will be much harder

[stelios_t]

The main advantage of Skywatcher mounts is EQMod software, which doesn't work with Celestron mounts. OTOH, there are workable alternatives for Celestron.

The Celestron AVX is by all accounts a worthy entry-level AP mount. It's at least the match of the EQ5, and competes with the HEQ5 with split opinions (it's newer, which is both good (latest tricks) and bad (not as thoroughly proven). The CGEM is comparable to the Atlas (EQ6) but the Atlas has had fewer issues so it's hard to recommend the CGEM over it. 

At the EQ6 level I'd go with Skywatcher. For an entry level, I'd either wait, (the HEQ5 (Sirius in the US) has been around a LONG time and now is on sale, so an upgrade may be coming up) or get the AVX.