Mount Choice Help

Hey Folks,

I have been out of Astronomy for some years, sold most of my equipment, however, I hung on to a a 10" Schmidt Newtonian OTA with Loasmandy plate, and I have a Taurus Tracker III with Focal Reducer, some T Adapters, and also have a vintage C5 OTA in a box. I believe the Meade SN OTA weighs about 30 pounds.

The big question i have is which mount is going to be my best value these days and which way should I Guide.

I have had my eye on the CGEM DX, or a old Pro or old CGE, however, I see iOptron, Orion, Losmandy all have options.

I had a CGE 14 and had tried the SN OTA on that mount, however, it was really awkward and I never had time to balance it all out so it never really got used. The OTA has been stored in a chest and foam since shortly after I got the LXD55 and sold the mount long ago.

So, being realistic, while I was an Asteroid hunter CCD wise and a Large Starmaster guy visual wise, I am far past the days where I can stay up all night on a regular basis, so whatever I buy will probably get used 4-5 times a year and I am wanting to stay under 3-4K total budget to get the OTA onto a good mount, get guiding or AO on it and used a DSLR as my primary image, I have 2 Nikon cameras, both FX.


So I need a mount and I need a really good Autoguider for it and software. Maxim doesn't look to support Nikon so it would seem that if self operating autoguiders are any good I might just consider minimal software, T mount the camera on the OTA, mount a small guide scope on the OTA and use my iPad remote software to set monitor focus and set the exposures off.

I want the images i take to be quality, so I want to do it enough right to have great results with some work, however, I am long past the days of spending the farm on Astro gear so I want to do some visual with that SN OTA as well with a limited number of eyepieces.

I need legs and or peer as well and I want it all to be as light as possible. The CGE was a beast and it would be nice if there were something lighter.

Are the iOptrons any good?
Is the CGEM DX a decent mount for imaging?
Whats a nice affordable guide or AO system that will work with DSLR as main imager?
Should I just forget the Taurus Tracker and go off axis?
Is the Orion Steady Star worth the investment for a setup like this and are their other alternatives?
Should I bother with the C5 Tube as the guider or maybe look to sell it and get a small guider scope?

Thanks in advance for anyone that can offer help!
Mark

Well, first off, DSLR imaging can be demanding and difficult to master. I know that many will argue this point but I can tell you that the experiences of those around me at our site show this is true.
Long focal lengths and DSLR is very tough. Wide field, especially cameras with lens attached can be very effective however. But once you try to use a long focal length with narrow field, the problems begin to stack up.
If you are going to attempt this and expect quality images, you will need to have a good mount, Off Axis guiding and a lot of patience.
Which mount? Well that is a hard one to answer. The weight, length of the scope, plus the weight of all camera gear and the pixel scale will all effect the choice.
I will pass on recommending any one mount. The reason for that is when you are trying to keep the price down then the mounts available have a great variation in the individual performance. What I a saying is that you might find a pretty good mount of a particular brand and model compared to most available. Or you could buy a not so great one and you will not know it until you begin using it.
I am not trying to put a damper on your plans but trying to give you some things to think about.