Advice on mount and camera

[Rover]

I have only been doing my new hobby for a few months and I recently upgraded from my starter scope and bought a Skywatcher Skyliner 200P Dobsonian. I am blown away with how much is out there and how much I can see with it.

Whilst I love just being able to pick it up and take it out I really want to be able to do imaging at some point in the future. I got the bug after I pointed my little Kodak camera down the lens and took the photo of the moon which is now my avatar.

I have a Phillips webcam and flashed it for taking planets but with no tracking even the moon was proving difficult. I am now looking at getting another mount and camera. I was thinking about an EQ5 with goto and a Canon 1000D. I think the weight limit is borderline to what it can cope with but I was wondering it anyone else had a similar setup and how they found it. I can probably work out the size of the rings I need to mount it but what size dovetail would I need?

Thanks in advance.

[nightfisher]

how about an eq5 and a mak like a skymax 127 then use webcam for lunar and planets

[Rover]

Would I be better getting the EQ5 with goto and the DSLR camera and get my hand in just doing imaging and then maybe get a refractor further down the line?

I would still be happy to mount the 200P on the EQ5 and webcam the planets in the meantime.

[brantuk]

I'd keep the dob for observing and get a short tube wide field appo for imaging with the EQ-5. You can pick up some great little appos s/h for bargain prices, there's not a lot to go wrong with them

[Rover]

Ok great thanks, I'll have a look about and get some ideas.

Could the 200P still be mounted on the EQ5? If so what size dovetail would I need?

Sorry if these are pretty simple questions, I still class myself as a Newbie.

[Jannis]

the 200p can easily be mounted on an EQ5, yes, and would also be stable enough for imagine.

But be awere that when adding the DSLR, pluss maybe a guidescope and guidecam, you're reaching the limit of the mount for a stable tracking for imaging.

[Rover]

That's great. Thanks everyone for all your replies.

[jgs001]

If your looking at getting into Deep Sky imaging, then I'd firstly recommend you buy

Books - Making Every Photon Count - Steve Richards

and have a good read first.

I've read that a 200p with guide setup is getting towards the upper limit of an HEQ5 for imaging, and the EQ5 is a lighter mount.

The thing to bear in mind, the mount is the key to a decent imaging setup. If you don't have a sturdy mount, it doesn't matter how good the scope and camera setup on top is, it's not going to be able to deliver as well as if you had a decent sturdy mount beneath.