Motorised mount for a Coronado PST?

[King]

Hi!

I've done all my imaging so far with this telescope mounted on a manual azimuth, which is great for a camera or certain binoculars but it's always been a bit of an endeavour for a moving Sun and I lost a screw for the horizontal axis which doesn't help. The mount has been waning for this sort of thing and the vertical movement is temperamental so I don't feel I'm getting the pristine results I should get with a more steady video.

Is there a simple, reasonable budget mount that would work well for this telescope, preferably needing as little (or no) extras as possible in order to actually attach the telescope?

It needs to run off the mains.

Thanks!

[brantuk]

I reckon a second hand EQ5 or CG5 tracking mount would do the trick.  Depends on your budget I guess - but assuming you have a bulk standard dovetail on the scope it would just fit straight on. You can get a 12V mains to ciggy socket adaptor from Maplins for under £20 to power it (or use an existing power pack).

Alternatively (and maybe a spot cheaper) a goto alt/az mount like this one wouldn't be bad: http://www.astrobuysell.com/uk/propview.php?view=80445

Hth

[GarethA]

The PST is sub 2kg and you wont be doing long exposures so any small tracking eq mount should do the job.

An eq3-2 with an RA drive i would have thought would have been more than adequate. I used to run eq3-2 RA motor off the mains using  the transformer from some old charger. Needs to be 6volts and capable of 500mA from memory.

AN astrotrac would be perfect and more compact - but also more money!

[King]

Thanks for the info!  I'll try and get this sorted out this week.  Also saw some information on a Coronado DS mount though that has mixed reviews.  I've also been advised to just use the GOTO mount that came with my Celestron Nexstar 8SE with an L shaped dovetail.  I wonder if that idea works in practice though because when I tried this with the Skymax-127 SupaTrak mount, tracking would go crazy and it turned out light was apparently getting through confusing it.  (Supposedly wrapping with cling film or some other light blocking solution fixes this.)  So yeah, knowing what my other options are is very helpful when considering this investment.

[Helen]

The SE mount is brilliant for solar work.  You can do a solar system align on the sun (you'll first need to drill into the menus to turn on the solar capability as its turned off by default for safety reasons, but that's a one-time job) and then it will track the sun very well.  I've used the SE for a PST, then a Lunt, and now a Solarmax set up  .

Helen

[Peter Drew]

+1 for the Se mount, I use one with a 80mm Ha telescope. 

[jonathan]

Maybe there's a use for my old SE mount yet!  Never did get on with it as a night time goto.

[King]

Thanks, it's nice to hear verification that it does a good job with solar telescopes!

What would I need to attach it in order for the telescope to be in its proper position, not sideways?  An astronomer on the phone at the Widescreen Centre says a Vixen L shaped dovetail would achieve that but if he's talking about this I don't see how that would work.

[pete_gamby]

He means one of these - http://www.firstlightoptics.com/slt-series/skywatcher-l-bracket-dovetail.html

[King]

Thanks everyone for the help!  I'm happy to announce (and show) the new setup is a success and I can even attach the glare guard.  (Though that does mean more limited access to a knob, that's only an issue for changing telescopes).

The suggestions regarding mount solutions aren't in vain either because at the moment both my telescopes have to share the SE mount.