Good grab and go mount.

wrote in message
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wrote:

this is very intriguing, but how long do the other (non goto) mounts
take to set up?

An alt az mount with no electronics and a tak sky 90 takes at most ten
seconds to set up. For something that light you could leave it
assembled and take it out in one piece.

www.universalastronomics.com

The UniStar Light Deluxe or the MicroStar are one good solution.

I'm using a Unistar Light on an older Vixen wood leg tripod with the
accessory tray removed for quick foldup. It can handle my Vixen 102F9 ED (8
lbs+eyepiece and finder weight) with only a little difficulty during
focusing. I'm about to pull the 102 and drop an ED80 on it though, which I
expect will be rock solid, and easier to carry through the door than the 33"
long 102F9 :-).

The UniStar Light and the Vixen tripod together weigh about 12 lbs. Add a
Sky90, and you've got something around 20 pounds that carries out in one
trip.

The nice thing about smaller aperture scopes, is that most of what they can
show, can be found pretty easily in "Dob and chart" mode. I use mine to get
a quick look at all those objects I can find by memory, with maybe just a
little sweeping around.

Putting it on a GoTo completely defeats the purpose. There is no such thing
as a "quick look" GoTo. Grab and Go, sure, but quick look, no way. It just
doesn't ever work out to be that easy, IME.

In fact, with the 102ED, my GEM GoTo sees a "Quick Align" about 90% of the
time. Going for those three stars is just more work than I want to do most
nights that I go out for an hour to look at a planet, or to poke around at
some doubles, bright nebula, opens, or larger globulars. Instead I just do a
quick polar scope polar alignment, get the mount into the home alignment
position, and turn on the clock drive by selecting the Quick Align option.
Then I slew the RA and Dec with the controller to point and look.

GoTo, I can take it or leave it. No big deal. Especially for small
apertures.

That's my take,
Stephen Paul
Shirley, MA

Stephen Paul wrote:
wrote in message
oups.com...

wrote:

this is very intriguing, but how long do the other (non goto)
mounts
take to set up?

An alt az mount with no electronics and a tak sky 90 takes at most
ten
seconds to set up. For something that light you could leave it
assembled and take it out in one piece.

www.universalastronomics.com

The UniStar Light Deluxe or the MicroStar are one good solution.

I'm using a Unistar Light on an older Vixen wood leg tripod with the
accessory tray removed for quick foldup. It can handle my Vixen 102F9
ED (8
lbs+eyepiece and finder weight) with only a little difficulty during
focusing. I'm about to pull the 102 and drop an ED80 on it though,
which I
expect will be rock solid, and easier to carry through the door than
the 33"
long 102F9 :-).

The UniStar Light and the Vixen tripod together weigh about 12 lbs.
Add a
Sky90, and you've got something around 20 pounds that carries out in
one
trip.

The nice thing about smaller aperture scopes, is that most of what
they can
show, can be found pretty easily in "Dob and chart" mode. I use mine
to get
a quick look at all those objects I can find by memory, with maybe
just a
little sweeping around.

Putting it on a GoTo completely defeats the purpose. There is no such
thing
as a "quick look" GoTo. Grab and Go, sure, but quick look, no way. It
just
doesn't ever work out to be that easy, IME.

In fact, with the 102ED, my GEM GoTo sees a "Quick Align" about 90%
of the
time. Going for those three stars is just more work than I want to do
most
nights that I go out for an hour to look at a planet, or to poke
around at
some doubles, bright nebula, opens, or larger globulars. Instead I
just do a
quick polar scope polar alignment, get the mount into the home
alignment
position, and turn on the clock drive by selecting the Quick Align
option.
Then I slew the RA and Dec with the controller to point and look.

GoTo, I can take it or leave it. No big deal. Especially for small
apertures.

That's my take,
Stephen Paul
Shirley, MA


I suppose a better question would be: which takes longer for a goto
mount setup or cooldown.

wrote:

I suppose a better question would be: which takes longer for a goto
mount setup or cooldown.


Not really.

First you need to understand what you mean by "grab and go".

A) you want to step outside real quick and get a look at that comet,
planet, big bright DSO, open cluster, nebula, or starfield.

B) you want to head out to a dark site, but don't want to carry a lot of
heavy equipment.

If (A), then the "better question" is whether you personally will find
setting up a GoTo to be worth the additional effort, when all you want
to do is poke around and look at a single object, or a few objects that
you already know where to find using just a 1.5 degree eyepiece and a
simple red dot finder.

Personally, my experience is that I don't find it worth the effort in
the least.

Unless I'm sporting an 8" scope or larger, I don' bother with GoTo. Like
I said, with the 102ED F9 on The GoTo GEM, I just use the GoTo motors as
a clock drive. It's also nice to have the slew limits that keep the OTA
from bashing into the tripod. That way I can leave the scope unattended
even near meridian, and not worry about it. I come out, and the clock
drive has stopped at the RA slew limit. I then manually do the meridian
flip, get back on target, and continue.

-Stephen

Stephen Paul wrote:
wrote:

I suppose a better question would be: which takes longer for a goto
mount setup or cooldown.


Not really.

First you need to understand what you mean by "grab and go".

A) you want to step outside real quick and get a look at that comet,
planet, big bright DSO, open cluster, nebula, or starfield.

B) you want to head out to a dark site, but don't want to carry a lot
of
heavy equipment.

If (A), then the "better question" is whether you personally will
find
setting up a GoTo to be worth the additional effort, when all you
want
to do is poke around and look at a single object, or a few objects
that
you already know where to find using just a 1.5 degree eyepiece and a

simple red dot finder.

Personally, my experience is that I don't find it worth the effort in

the least.

Unless I'm sporting an 8" scope or larger, I don' bother with GoTo.
Like
I said, with the 102ED F9 on The GoTo GEM, I just use the GoTo motors
as
a clock drive. It's also nice to have the slew limits that keep the
OTA
from bashing into the tripod. That way I can leave the scope
unattended
even near meridian, and not worry about it. I come out, and the clock

drive has stopped at the RA slew limit. I then manually do the
meridian
flip, get back on target, and continue.

-Stephen

so what your saying then is a 31mm nagler is better than any goto
regardless of setup time.
thanks, I hadnt considred that either.

wrote in message
oups.com...

so what your saying then is a 31mm nagler is better than any goto
regardless of setup time.
thanks, I hadnt considred that either.

Well, that's one interpretation I suppose.