NEQ6 - Bolt to secure to pier plate ?

[Astrokev]

Hi All

This is probably a stupid question, but here goes anyway...

I am mounting my NEQ6 on a pier plate (16mm thick) using a Altair Astro adapter. I'm still designing my pier, but this will be concrete filled tube. Attaching the plate to the pier will be straight forward, and I already have the AA adapter attached to the pier plate, but I'm wondering what bolt to use to attach the NEQ6 to the plate/adapter.

My initial (and current) plan is to use the standard Skywatcher central bolt that comes with the tripod, but this is quite long, and will require some fiddling of the top of the pier to accommodate this, which is not ideal.

Ideally I am therefore looking for a short bolt to secure the mount to the plate.  Lots of folks have NEQ6/AA adapters on piers and appear to use securing bolts other than the supplied SW bolt. I've looked on a few sites but can't find any commercially available bolts to do this - do they exist, or do other folks fabricate their own?

Any thoughts / guidance would be much appreciated!

Thanks

kev

[Sp@ce_d]

Do a googles for "m12 hand wheel" I got some from these guys a few years back when I was using the eq6 on the pier. https://uk.essentracomponents.com

[r3i]

Hi Kev,

I used to use an EQ6 on a garden pier and used an M12 lever bolt to attach the mount to the pier.  See this link to a previous post I made about it: 

 

[Astrokev]

Thanks r3i. Your previous thread is really helpful ?

Thanks also to the others who also replied - much appreciated.