|
Here is my Classic 8
on a CG-5 GEM mount robo-scoped with Autostar
The RA drive is connected to
the plastic housing that comes on the CG5 mount. I cut the threads
off of a Meade 492 worm housing, and attached the them to the housing.
I cut a rectangle portion of this housing for the Computer Control
module. The DEC drive is attached to a 3/4" X 1/8" X 7" strip of
Aluminum with a wood block and blue electrical tape. The OTA is
attached to the CG5 via a homemade dovetail bar made from scrap oak and
aluminum. My neighbor owns a machine shop, and machined me two
brass adapters as specified Chris Erickson's retrofitting guide.
Many thanks to Yahoo Roboscope
group. Especially Joe Bauer and Chris Erickson for their designs. |
|
|
|
DEC Drive and Oak Dovetail
|
|
|
|
RA Drive and Computer Control on plastic housing
|
|
|
|
Hand Controller attached to tripod via Velcro
|
|
|
Click
image for larger picture |
|
1-Feb-2005 First Light with new mount:
Poor seeing conditions (shooting over the top of my house),
plus my scope is out of collimation slightly from the retrofit work.
I was really just wanting to see how the mount performed.
I didn't try any Goto's, but the tracking was excellent. I use
to be happy if I could keep Saturn on the Toucam chip for 1-2 minutes
without having manually recenter. I was able to go 10 minutes or
so without having to touch the hand controller. This was by
eyeballing Polaris thru the hole in my RA axis. I don't have a
polar alignment scope. The mount is also much more stable than my
original Celestron Fork mount on a heavy-duty tripod. Dampening
times are 1 second or less. All in all, I'm very happy with the
results. |
  |