NEQ6 AND SIMILAR MOUNTS GOTO

[DAVE AMENDALL]

Hi, Makes me wonder how long these type of  mounts last before they need attention what with regular use ,dew formation, (connector pin corrosion because of dampness) motor problems  and the like. My NEQ6 is permanently  sited in an obsey and has been trouble free for 5 years (touch wood) but we still live  in a poor climate in  the Uk which seem to play havoc with everything it touches over a period of time. Comments welcome....Dave

[malc-c]

My 200p / HEQ5 combo has been housed in an observatory for around 9 years, and at times stood unused for upwards of 18 months... only issues I found were a layer of dust on the outside of the tube, and the need to check for collimation just in case any slip in the optics due to park position, or if the scope had been accidently knocked in that time.  Other than that the mount has seen no other maintenance since the day it was installed.

[Hallingskies]

Your concerns about the electrics are reasonable I think, but the NEQ6s seem to be fairly robust old beasts! 
I have had an NEQ6 for over 10 years.  It spent 7 years being wheeled in and out of a garage and a further 3 years in a observatory.  I occasionally wonder about belt mods, sprung-loaded worms, bearing regreases etc, but I’m a great believer in not fixing something that ain’t broken...

I finally replaced it with a second-hand Avalon but I have no intention of selling the NEQ6.  The Avalon looks and sounds nicer and is a more accurate go-to mount, but its astrophotography performance is not hugely better than the 10 year old NEQ6 IMO given my usual seeing conditions.

[newbie alert]

11 hours ago, Hallingskies said:

Your concerns about the electrics are reasonable I think, but the NEQ6s seem to be fairly robust old beasts! 
I have had an NEQ6 for over 10 years.  It spent 7 years being wheeled in and out of a garage and a further 3 years in a observatory.  I occasionally wonder about belt mods, sprung-loaded worms, bearing regreases etc, but I’m a great believer in not fixing something that ain’t broken...

I finally replaced it with a second-hand Avalon but I have no intention of selling the NEQ6.  The Avalon looks and sounds nicer and is a more accurate go-to mount, but its astrophotography performance is not hugely better than the 10 year old NEQ6 IMO given my usual seeing conditions.

The Avalon should be far better astrophotography wise

[Hallingskies]

2 hours ago, newbie alert said:

The Avalon should be far better astrophotography wise

It’s more about conditions than equipment, I reckon.  On nights of good seeing, the Avalon will turn in a guiding rms of around 0.5, whereas the best I ever had from the NEQ6 was about 0.8.  But those evenings are few and far between.  Imaging at around 550mm fl, anything better than 1 seems OK, and the NEQ6 got the job done most nights.

The Avalon is better, sure, but not FAR better in that respect. But it is VERY pretty, very quiet, lighter (much easier to handle) and extremely accurate on goto: the alt-az adjustments are much better than the NEQ6 and therefore it is much easier to accurately polar align.

In fact, the one upgrade to the NEQ6 I would consider would be this one...

The alt-az bolts on the NEQ6 are pretty crude and can chew up the alloy casing after a while.  Mine looks ok, but I could imagine that over tightening them could cause some damage - something to keep an eye on with older mounts.

Edited November 25, 2020 by Hallingskies

[DAVE AMENDALL]

Hi, There is a £50 set of upgrade on these Az bolts . they may make a difference on the chewing problem ???...............Dave

[malc-c]

2 hours ago, DAVE AMENDALL said:

Hi, There is a £50 set of upgrade on these Az bolts . they may make a difference on the chewing problem ???...............Dave

It's not so much the bolts that bend, it's the soft metal they push against to make the mount move ! - The upgrade bolts help (worth searching for ratchet bolts on the net as they can be had a lot cheaper than £50), but the EQ6 rail is a nice workaround to the problem.  Years back Dion over at Astronomy Shed was working on a high precision alternative

https://youtu.be/PM7JH7vBNFU

[DAVE AMENDALL]

I see the point Malcolm . Thanks for sharing the you tube video ...Dave

[Ceph]

Not everything is a walk in the park, there are always two sides of a coin, and I have seen the other side of the coin, bad luck?

There are many names of what it is called when you have bought something you should not, bad luck?
In my case the dealer recomended this gear tube and mount and the dealer after purchase will not help.

This is my story with Skywatcher and others and in some way as I am still writing here means that I have not lost hope
I just got bad luck and Skywatcher will ever never be my choice again not only the mount but also the tube.

I still love this hobby, just not some brands. I wish that I could get another mount and another tube but I am not loaded with money

My sad story
http://www.itskane.se/picastro.asp?part=4

 

 

[DAVE AMENDALL]

You have my sympathy That is a very bad luck train of events...Dave

[malc-c]

Seems you did have a run of bad luck.  However you will probably find the majority of EQ6 mounts will contain shards of metal.  Combination of mass production, cheap soft metal and poor design.  But then in the scheme of things the mounts are at the bottom of the mount evolutionary tree.  Yes granted they cost £1000, which is to most people a lot of money, but it's the equivalent of the £9.99 casio watch from a supermarket... it tells the time the same as a Rolex, but not to the degree of precision, or built to the same standards.    

The other issue is that due to the dealership structure you seldom get the support you think you should.  The dealer may have recommended this mount / OTA, but they may could not be expected to know what state the bearings are in, or if a shaft has scoring marks on it.  The retailers with whom you have the contract with can only return things to the sole importer / distributor.  Through my own experience I know first hand that often the retailers relationship with the distributor can become fractious as they don't get the support to help their customers.  Occasionally an agreement is made for the customer to contact the distributor direct, but in my case that direct support can stop and you get referred back to the retailer, so you go round in circles. 

Astronomy is an expensive hobby, especially if you want to be serious about it.  I've seen rigs with cameras costing more than I paid for my second hand car, attached to OTA's valued at £10,000, on mounts of equal value.  It's the precision, control and the fact that these may have been hand assembled in clean air rooms and have the tolerances of a swiss made watch that you pay for.

Whilst the quality of the EQ6 could well be improved, higher quality castings, harder bolts and a change in its polar alignment design, I doubt that it will happen. It would probably push the price of the mount out of the reach of the average enthusiast who wants to get into imaging.

[DAVE AMENDALL]

Twenty thousand Euros plus which reminds me of my lottery winner friend Edwin,who resides in the Canary Islands. I was supposed to pay him a visit to look at his set up, but will have to wait now until Covid restrictions are lifted.................Dave

[Ceph]

Seems?

I can not understand that you accept the fact that skywatcher mount is filled with shards of metall and they could be so be, and in the same time comparing a dumb watch 9.99 with a Rolex, what does that has to do with anything?

When I started this hobby I saw a fantastic pic. Ohhh I would like to take that one as well. After checking what this guy had for equipment, it would have cost me above £40000 to buy the same gear, so..... What does that has anything to do with my NEQ6?

Yes it is an expensive hobby and the NEQ6 could be improved, but I disagree on what could have been improved without loss of money from the manufacturer, China always takes shortcuts and they are not interested in any feed back. But they could fix many issues without it would have cost them... too much. Buisness are buisness and as long as I buy their monday sample nothing will improve.

And finally Malm-c Where you actually informing me that Astronomy is an expensive hobby as an info to me?

If we all accepts this issues from a manufacturer that dont give care, it will never end. the problem is that this hobby is so small that the dealers have all the power.

 

[malc-c]

1 hour ago, Ceph said:

Seems?

I can not understand that you accept the fact that skywatcher mount is filled with shards of metall and they could be so be, and in the same time comparing a dumb watch 9.99 with a Rolex, what does that has to do with anything?

When I started this hobby I saw a fantastic pic. Ohhh I would like to take that one as well. After checking what this guy had for equipment, it would have cost me above £40000 to buy the same gear, so..... What does that has anything to do with my shitty NEQ6?

Yes it is an expensive hobby and the NEQ6 could be improved, but I disagree on what could have been improved without loss of money from the manufacturer, China always takes shortcuts and they are not interested in any feed back. But they could fix many issues without it would have cost them... too much. Buisness are buisness and as long as I buy their monday sample nothing will improve.

And finally Malm-c Where you actually informing me that Astronomy is an expensive hobby as an info to me?

If we all accepts this issues from a manufacturer that dont give care, it will never end. the problem is that this hobby is so small that the dealers have all the power.

 

You totally missed the point of my post.  No worries...

The point I was trying to make was that as far as SW mounts are concerned they are at the lower end of the scale, hence the comparison with a mass produced watch... The do the job, but being made to a price point lack the quality parts or assembled to a lower standard than a more expensive product (hence the comparison to a rolex which I guess in this hobby could be a Takahashi mount).  It is not that you won't be able to get an image similar to the one you saw with the £40000 set up, but it may not as detailed and sharp, and may have to do more with your setup due to the limitations of the equipment.

Now if you feel that your budget mount (when compared to those next in the astronomy evolutionary tree) has not been made to the standard you expect, and wish to complain then that's your prerogative.  If it is within warranty then you could demand that the mount be repaired or replaced through the dealership.  However they could equally say that by opening the mount up you have invalidated any warranty and walk away.... and to be honest they are well within their rights to do so.  It may well be that there are loads of SW mounts that are poorly finished in the same way, with swarf inside them... and I dare say that if everyone complained on mass once the voice was loud enough something may get done... but (and the point I was trying to explain) is that SW are so distant from their end user they don't give a flying fig.  As far as they are concerned who is going to know if the inside of the mount is free of swarf or not, most people don't open their mounts for fear of voiding the warranty.  I don't think it's costing thing, as the time it would take for someone to either blast the casing with an airline, or (if automated) code the CCM machine to tip the swarf out would be small.

The dealers don't have all the power.. that's what I was explaining.  The dealer deals with the importers / distributor / wholesaler - they then deal with the manufacture (Synta) who are manufacturing SW and Celestron scopes in their thousands each week... Your contract when you purchase the scope is with the dealer / retailer.  If they can't resolve any issue you have, then they report it to the distributor.  If they received similar complaints from lots of dealers then they may feed that back to the manufacture, who may take action.  The problem is that if the distributor seem to be constantly upsetting the apple cart they can have their exclusivity removed and the manufacturer will appoint a new distributor.... so you find the distributors don't want to complain.   How do I know this... through personal experience I had with my 200P ATA, which in the end left me out of pocket, and the relationship between the retailer I purchased the scope from and the Distributor / Importer very soured.  At the time several other people with the same issue came forward but neither the Distributor or SW were interested in trying to resolve this for all customers without cost.

I've no advice for you.... you've highlighted an issue on a public forum, and complained to the dealer, but  unless they get the support from the importer then there is little they can do other than replace the package, which might be just as bad.  Or your equipment may well be one in 10,000 that slipped through the QC ?  

There's a guy in the UK that supertunes these mounts by the way.  From the factory you can expect an HEQ5 / EQ6 to have 20-30 arc seconds of error unguided.  They tune the mount and guarantee sub 1 arc second accuracy.  They replace all the bearings, use specialist lubricants and precision machined gear sets, and for an additional cost do a belt mod at the same time. But the cost is between £300 and £550 plus 2 or 3 way shipping.  That then puts the cost of the EQ6 at around £1600, but its still half the price of an EQ8 and probably has more precision ?https://www.darkframeoptics.com/

Whatever path you follow I wish you well.... 

 

[Ceph]

7 hours ago, malc-c said:

You totally missed the point of my post.  No worries...

The point I was trying to make was that as far as SW mounts are concerned they are at the lower end of the scale, hence the comparison with a mass produced watch... The do the job, but being made to a price point lack the quality parts or assembled to a lower standard than a more expensive product (hence the comparison to a rolex which I guess in this hobby could be a Takahashi mount).  It is not that you won't be able to get an image similar to the one you saw with the £40000 set up, but it may not as detailed and sharp, and may have to do more with your setup due to the limitations of the equipment.

Now if you feel that your budget mount (when compared to those next in the astronomy evolutionary tree) has not been made to the standard you expect, and wish to complain then that's your prerogative.  If it is within warranty then you could demand that the mount be repaired or replaced through the dealership.  However they could equally say that by opening the mount up you have invalidated any warranty and walk away.... and to be honest they are well within their rights to do so.  It may well be that there are loads of SW mounts that are poorly finished in the same way, with swarf inside them... and I dare say that if everyone complained on mass once the voice was loud enough something may get done... but (and the point I was trying to explain) is that SW are so distant from their end user they don't give a flying fig.  As far as they are concerned who is going to know if the inside of the mount is free of swarf or not, most people don't open their mounts for fear of voiding the warranty.  I don't think it's costing thing, as the time it would take for someone to either blast the casing with an airline, or (if automated) code the CCM machine to tip the swarf out would be small.

The dealers don't have all the power.. that's what I was explaining.  The dealer deals with the importers / distributor / wholesaler - they then deal with the manufacture (Synta) who are manufacturing SW and Celestron scopes in their thousands each week... Your contract when you purchase the scope is with the dealer / retailer.  If they can't resolve any issue you have, then they report it to the distributor.  If they received similar complaints from lots of dealers then they may feed that back to the manufacture, who may take action.  The problem is that if the distributor seem to be constantly upsetting the apple cart they can have their exclusivity removed and the manufacturer will appoint a new distributor.... so you find the distributors don't want to complain.   How do I know this... through personal experience I had with my 200P ATA, which in the end left me out of pocket, and the relationship between the retailer I purchased the scope from and the Distributor / Importer very soured.  At the time several other people with the same issue came forward but neither the Distributor or SW were interested in trying to resolve this for all customers without cost.

I've no advice for you.... you've highlighted an issue on a public forum, and complained to the dealer, but  unless they get the support from the importer then there is little they can do other than replace the package, which might be just as bad.  Or your equipment may well be one in 10,000 that slipped through the QC ?  

There's a guy in the UK that supertunes these mounts by the way.  From the factory you can expect an HEQ5 / EQ6 to have 20-30 arc seconds of error unguided.  They tune the mount and guarantee sub 1 arc second accuracy.  They replace all the bearings, use specialist lubricants and precision machined gear sets, and for an additional cost do a belt mod at the same time. But the cost is between £300 and £550 plus 2 or 3 way shipping.  That then puts the cost of the EQ6 at around £1600, but its still half the price of an EQ8 and probably has more precision ?https://www.darkframeoptics.com/

Whatever path you follow I wish you well.... 

 

OK I see your point, you are right I missed at first

Thanks