Do you need a good telescope mount?
Prof Brian Warner gave an interesting talk at the observatory on Sept 1st, which was, as always, much enjoyed by those who attended.
The gist of the lecture centred around the wonderful work amateur astronomers are doing with modest equipment, mostly collaborating with professional astronomers. Indeed some of the results obtained are of professional quality. All you have to do is put a CCD camera on your telescope and you too can do high quality serious astronomy. Well, sort of.....
What you need to do this type of astronomy is this :-
Now quite a number of us have items 1 and 4. Obviously the bigger your telescope the fainter the objects you can see - with a 12-inch telescope you can get down to about 18th mag with a CCD camera - but a 10-inch or even 6-inch will enable you to join some of the serious programs that are currently under way. Prof Warner talked about item 3 and there are lots of alternatives on the market.
But item 2, the mounting with a good, accurate motor drive is one item few people have on their telescopes. Certainly not the quality to do long term photography or photometry.
This talk has prompted us to make enquiries about having a batch of motor driven mountings made up by an engineering firm.
We are looking for a German equatorial mounting that will have an accurate motor drive and probably digital setting circles. It may also have motor adjustment on both axes.
It will be a standard size but will have different attachment plates to fit any size tripod/pier and any size telescope.
Perhaps the Mark 2 version could have connections to a PC so that you could automatically move to any object in the sky
If you are interested in acquiring a good mount for your telescope then please contact me ASAP. The more we have made up the lower the cost will be.
Brian Fraser
Tel: W 871-0370
H 803-8291
Email: brian.fraser@macsteel.co.za