SW EQ3-2 RA drive

[ardbeg74]

With batteries bought and a clear night tonight I tried out the RA drive i bought for my EQ3-2. These are my first impressions.

I was somewhat doubtful as to whether this would perform or not. Build wise the handset and battery compartment have a "I built this myself from stock maplin bits" feel to it. So on appearance alone i was curious to what my £70 had bought me. The motor drive unit is of similar plastic housing and is attached by a bracket that resembles the kind you get with flat pack cabinet. Ya know, the ones to prevent the cabinet tipping over,  that end up in your "bits" box. 

The attachment to the slomo controls is of flexible plastic and is secured with a 2mm allen screw. Once locked in place this prevents use of the opposite ra slomo cable unless the allen screw is loosened. Not a particularly good solution to fiddle with in the dark. I do feel however that some DIY improvement could be made to this, perhaps using a winged bolt and something created from a flexible screwdriver shaft or other such thing. 

In use the inability to use the RA slowmo cable was not an issue however. With both dec and ra mount clutches released it was perhaps and almost dobsonian experience pushing the scope while looking through the finder, then fine tuning with a 25mm ep before securing the clutches again.

The 8x drive felt painfully slow with the 25mm ep but having aligned the dec, a quick loosening of the ra clutch and a gentle push centred my target, Jupter, perfectly. Where, to my surprise it stayed with out any visible signs of movement.

A change to 10mm, 8mm BST followed and Jupiter remained in the FOV. I then barlowed (2x) the 25mm, 10mm and 8mm. In all cases a little 8x RA adjustment was required to centre in the EP but i was pleasantly surprised how accurately it had maintained the tracking between changing EP's.

There was a little drift on the barlowed 8mm after 5 or so minutes however this was painlessly corrected with the handset. The view remained rock solid during this providing uninterrupted viewing. More evident was my poor polar alignment, after a short break I returned to the EP to find Jupiter had almost left the FOV on the dec axis. RA still seemed to be accurate to a Jupiter width or less.

Now came the critical test, centred with the barlowed 25mm, the EP was then exchanged for the 10mm with a-focal adapter and panasonic lumix camera attached. (this had been previously adjusted for vignetting / centring on the ep ) Jupiter was immediately noticeable going off screen bottom left. A remarkable result first time. With  3x optical zoom applied and fine adjustment of the camera alignment, another touch of the dec control and RA handset had Jupiter centred once again. Again only my sloppy polar alignment caused noticeable drift. RA drift was not significant over the 1m recording.

Then the final test, 7x camera zoom. This had Jupiter taking up 1/3 the width of the screen. There was some RA drift, though this was easily compensated with the handset.

Over the rest of the evening i found the RA drive to greatly enhance my viewing experience. Although on assuming my position at the scope my hand instinctively grasped the RA slomo controls, something of a habit that is no longer required. ( at least while the batteries last )

All in I am extremely happy with this purchase, for visual work it means no shaking of the scope while manually tracking the target, allowing the eye to resolve more detail,  and has far exceeded my expectations for planetary work, having shot 2m 45sec of footage ( before the camera battery died ) and having all of that footage available for aligning / stacking.

Probably the best £70 i have spent in a long time.  

Anyways, sorry that was longer than I expected

Clear skies

Mark

[Alien 13]

Hi Mark nice write up i use one for imaging and it works very well i do agree with the 8x speed being to slow ive considered modding it but not sure what it would do to the motor.

I have found battery life to be suprisingly good for me, the only real gripe i have is the brightness of the green LED when its running so i plan to change it sometime (i have controller ty rapped to tripod leg).

Alan

[ardbeg74]

Cheers Alan,

Yes a faster speed would be nice, say 16x or 32x, but perhaps the motor cant deliver that. I thought the led was a bit bright too, strange choice of green for night use, would have thought red would have been better. Though they do have that dual colour thing going on when you press a button for some reason. I'll probably just stick a bit of masking tape over it.

Attaching to the tripod leg is a good idea, will get some velcro i think. Though cable ties sounds tidy! Was tempted to buy the auto-focuser, and i guess a dew heater wouldnt go a miss either, so scope is going to be covered in cables and battery packs by the time im finished.

Have you tried it with any DSO work?  Obviously its not going to support long exposures, but be interesting to know whats capable with it. 

All the best

Mark

[Alien 13]

Hi Mark,

My mount has a few cables on it when its up and running, polarscope illuminator camera cables and motor drive but not got a dew heater yet.

I have found my mount with good polar alignment does 2 min subs with no problems i cant go much above that due to LP and having a fast scope but im sure it could do more though.

This is one from the other night 10x 45 second subs not done anything to the core yet but was more of a practice run.

[ardbeg74]

Hi Alan,

Thats incredible. Well done! I honestly had no idea it would track accurately enough for that. I spent a good while looking at M42 / 43 last night. Light pollution is a killer, really struggled to get any contrast at all and of course the moon didnt help either.

If i can manage 45 sec subs i'll be well happy. Though with a long focal length and tiny sensor ( got asi 120mm yesterday but not tried it yet ) im going to have to choose my DSO targets carefully But now sorted for planetary work... if only the clouds would part

Clear skies

Mark

[RikM]

The EQ3-2 is a remarkably underrated mount. A lot depends on your focal length but I could get 90sec - 2min at a push out of mine with a 750mm F/5 150P. With a 300mm camera lens it would do 3min easily and that was as long as I needed for the shots I wanted.

It's not great but was great fun and I learned a lot before upgrading.

[Alien 13]

Nice pictures Rik,

The EQ3-2 is as Rik said underated but with careful polar alignment  and choice of load then it works well.

It suits me perfectly because i can carry the whole lot with scope and camera out in one go, i normally do all the preset stuff like polar scope position using "polar finder" software in the kitchen where i can see what im doing then lock it all off.

Alan

[ardbeg74]

Wow awesome pics Ric. Totally blown away by what you and Allan have achieved. 

All too often i've read that the minimum is an heq5 or 6 with synscan, guide camera etc etc.. but this isnt the case at all. Sure if you want exceptionally long exposures, have a heavy scope or are chasing fainter and fainter targets then yea it is sound advice. But seems that if you dont want to blow the cost of a small car on your kit, all is not lost.

Really inspired by what can be done with that mount in competent hands. For me, AP is interesting because its challenging, technical and also because it will allow me to see things that my eye cannot. To really appreciate the true beauty of the universe. Its also something i had never intended to get into... if i had, i'd probably still be saving up for equipment... and maybe given up on the whole idea altogether.

Thanks guys, you have set the bar for me and now i cant wait to get out there and start learning.

All the best

Mark