Star discovery wooden pier** Pics added**

[Beulah]

Nice work in making a fairly unobtrusive spot for astronomy! I got permission for a 'starpad' provided it doubled up as a patio - three years later it is still getting used a lot.

Your garden is coming on well with those flowers I can see in the photo...

Lovely view!!!

[Alfian]

A fair ladies touch! That is one unique pier.

[nightfisher]

On 8/18/2017 at 18:32, Alfian said:

A fair ladies touch! That is one unique pier.

Yes it is rather unique, but it does the job rather well.

@Beulah the garden has come on in leaps and bounds, its a nice place, we get cows grazing less than 7ft from our back fence

[Adam J]

On 12/08/2017 at 17:08, nightfisher said:

Okay, the bit you have all been waiting for, the pier is about done, and by an large it ticks all the box`es i wanted to achieve.

It is now quick to set up, simply drop the mount ready attached to its ply disk onto the 3 M8 bolts and fasten wingnuts, no more leveling a wobbly tripod!

It is at just the right height for visual but i will have to go out of the garden to view in the East but this is less likely as i would be viewing over rooftops.

All in all i am very pleased with how it has come together, if there is one flaw the over engineered pier shows up any movement in the AZ mount head, but first impression is this set up is about 8 times more stable than when used on a tripod

Interesting stuff, I hope that you have a gate in that fence!

[nightfisher]

@Adam J i guess by that you are thinking about viewing from other side of fence to east yes there is a gate just out of shot with an unused footpath between my fence and field

[happy-kat]

I remember you asked for alignment info from manual for altaz

Whilst it's cloudy I am reading again the synscan mamual and the chestnut to remember for this mount ALtAz:

Rules for choosing alignment stars:

• It is recommended that the altitude of the two alignment stars are between 15 and 60 degrees and the deviation of altitude is between 10 and 30 degrees.

• The azimuth deviation of the two alignment stars can be between 45 and 135 degrees, it is best to be close to 90 degrees.