Posts Made By: Marc Bourque

Hi all,
Does anyone know of a source for a CAD drawing or dimensional outline for the losmandy GM-8? Asking as I'd like to get some custom foam cut for my storage case. Yes, I know scopeguard makes a case for this; yes, I know you can marker outline pick-n-pluck foam, but these are not the solutions I want.
I have the mount on order, so can't measure it up for my case before it arrives.
Anyway, if anyone knows, let me know.
If none seems to exist, I'll try to see if Scott Losmandy has the basic outline drawing of this mount.

Thanks,
Marc.

Hi all,

Eventually I will be getting more involved in astrophotography and was wondering about choices for guidescopes, good, bad or otherwise.

I see a lot of people chroose 80mm refractors for small to med size setups and it goes up the aperture scale from there. Is there anything intrinsically wrong with using a small Mak-Cass (say Orion's 90mm Mak)? Seems small and light enough with a good focal length (?)

Comments welcome.

Marc B.

For my part I have a Berlebach UNI-8 tripod
http://www.berlebach.de/e_index.php (products-astrocomponents)

These tripods are built very solid, are far superior to the widely available surveyor tripods seen everywhere and can handle 60kg (130lbs). They also have tripod heads for a variety of mounts including GM-8/G11 and EM-200.
Their wooden construction gives them excellent vibration damping properties and the leg clamping system makes them feel as if they were one solid piece.
Berlebach have also introduced a couple new tripods I'm curious about, the "Planet" and "Sky". Their weight handling capacity is quite impressive 100kg (220lbs) for the Planet and 140kg (308lbs) for the Sky. The Sky also incorporates a significant amount of carbon fibre, but at a very steep cost (~$2200!!)

I'm very pleased with the performance of mine with my installation, and when I upgrade to a GM-8 mount later this year I'm considering one of these tripods to replace the stock Losmandy LW tripod supplied.

At any rate as traditional tripods go, I'd say these are among the best... for a price.

Marc B.