Manfrotto 410 junior head or 405 geared head?

[Chris Hopson]

Morning SGLers,

Whilst I was at the Herstmonceux Astronomy festival last week, I was lucky enough to get a de-mounted 125mm ETX, with the lovely North American nebula decorated tube. ( weighs in at 3kg, with metal lens cap).But my ex demo horizon tripod has finally seen better days, and needs replacing.

I've noticed some of you use the Manfrotto 405 pro geared head, to mount a scope for grab & go. But how does the 410 Junior stand against it?

There is a massive price point difference.

Many thanks,

Chris

[Astroscot2]

I had a 410 for my Astrotrac a few years back, i was never all that impressed with it, there was a slight looseness that i could never resolve. Would look at alternatives if i was in the market for something similar.

[Chris Hopson]

Astroscot2

Thanks for you opinion.

Chris.

[andrew63]

If you are looking just to mount it on photo  tripod - and you need a good tripod to mount the ex125, as in effect you have a 1900mm telephoto lens and will get vibrations.  These are some alternatives to a geared head that i have been looking at.  The eLLe is very sturdy and is shown with a Mak in the illustration.  Or a manfrotto fluid head is an option - this is very popular for  astro grab and go.

Tecnosky eLLe Binomount for large binoculars-TecnoBinomount

Manfrotto M Size Flat Base Pro Video Head MVH502AH: Amazon.co.uk: Camera & Photo

I ended up with the manfrotto fluid head to use on my sturdy manfrotto braced tripod 074.

I would be ideal if you could try a few different combinations though, as they all offer pros and cons.  That telescope will be great, nice quality optics.

andrew

[Chris Hopson]

Andrew63,

Thank you Andrew, that has certainly given me more options. I wasn't aware fluid heads were so popular, the only concern for me is the Manfrotto is recommended up to 4 kg. My ETX with an eyepiece will weigh about 3.5kg, I'm just wondering if that might be pushing it too much?

The Tecnosky eLLe Binomount, are very interesting, serving a purpose for my 15 x 70 binos and the ETX. It's also rated to 8kg, so I'm assuming it would hold my scope easily.

I wonder if anybody on SGL has any experience with this mount or similar using a mak? (Maybe I should repost that) .

Regards,

Chris

[happy-kat]

There is a interesting post here.

http://stargazerslounge.com/topic/247988-grab-and-go-mount-ball-head-and-pan-plate-combo/?fromsearch=1

[Chris Hopson]

Happy-Kat,

Thanks for link, that is a great setup. Unfortunately not for me, as the eyepiece holder would be positioned horizontally.

But I still want one.

Regards,

Chris

[happy-kat]

I thought the 125mm ETX was essentially a MAK so eye piece like on a frac.

[Chris Hopson]

Are you saying put the ep in the back?

If so, I don't know if that's possible, there's no visual back like my c8?

If you mean put a ETX diagonal in the back, than yes that can be done, but my finder would be in the wrong place.

Regards

Chris

[happy-kat]

Not how I was thinking then.

[Psychobilly]

The larger and much more expensive 405 (I have one) suffers the same sort of problems and I wouldn't fancy using it for precise alignment of the scope...  I used to use it for polar aligning the Astrotrac but use a skywatcher  wedge instead now...

Peter...

[steppenwolf]

Although the 410 does a reasonable job, I remain pretty disappointed with mine - severe backlash requires carefully planning the direction in which you make the final adjustments. Somewhat to my surprise, I found it to be a pretty coarse device although it is quite substantial.

[Chris Hopson]

Thanks Peter and Steve, that's been very helpful

Regards

Chris