Astronomy Buff

Easy and Portable Telescope Tracking

by Tony on March 13th, 2007

What? You’re not sitting in your comfy chair right now wishing you had an easy and portable solution for guiding the stars for one of your telescopes?

You’re not drooling over the latest gadgets listed in Penthouse for Astronomers (err, I mean, Sky and Telescope)? Well, I am. Of course, I only read it for the articles. I never pull out the centerfold showing this month’s sky chart of what’s up tonight (other than the obvious, but I digress…)

For years, I’ve been looking for a small drive that will allow me to track the stars. I’ve wanted something portable and accurate with very easy setup that let’s me throw one of my many smaller telescopes that do not have a drive onto it and do some imaging.

Sometimes, I just want to clamp something on a balcony railing or a car window, put a small scope on it, and track the sky. I’m sorry, but I just do, okay?

That need (nay, that desire, that passion) has been more pronounced since I bought a Coronado PST H-alpha telescope. I would really appreciate being able to track the sun with the PST mounted on a video tripod, dammit.

I usually envisioned something simple, I’ve even thought about building one myself. Something like a synchronous AC motor mounted to a worm gear and driving a small platform upon which I could mount a variety of smaller optical devices.

Unfortunately, most of the small clock drives I’ve seen were poorly constructed. I did consider buying an Orion TeleTrack Mount. I decided against it when I saw one at a star party - it looked real cheesy and didn’t go up past 60 degrees.

Reading through this month’s Sky and Telescope magazine, I saw an ad for the AstroTrac TT 320 which looks very promising. The company is located in the UK but North American Customers can get this from Kendrick Astro Instruments. According to their site, the drives start shipping in April.

The cost is substantially more than other mounts of this size and payload, presumably due the increased accuracy. Kendrick’s site lists the drive at $620 CAD ($530 USD) and you can get an optional polar finder scope for $95 CAD ($80 USD).

The technical specs claim that it’ll track the stars for up to 2 hours with “high accuracy” and will work with standard video and photographic tripods. It can hold up to 10 kg (22 lbs).

From Kendrick Astro Instruments:

The TT320 tracks the motion of the stars for up to 2 hours with high accuracy, eliminating the usual star trails in fixed long exposure images of the night sky or the need to constantly re-adjust your manual Alt-Az mount. You can, with this very light and stable mount, build up your astrophoto exposures over a few minutes, revealing the deeper structure and beauty of the sky. It’s the perfect product for anyone interested in wide field imaging with a camera and lens, a spotting scope, or telescope or for anyone wanting to do visual observing using magnifications ranging from low to high power. Because it’s small and portable enough to fit into your camera bag or suitcase or accessory case, you can take it anywhere you can take a camera and tripod, without the weight, awkward shape, and inconvenience of an equatorial mount.

i have to say, this looks like what I’ve been waiting for. I’ll probably order one later this month with the intention of putting my Coronado PST on it. I’ll let you know.

Now, back to my Astronomy Porn. Oooh, look at Cassiopeia… mmmmmmmmm. Look at the gas clouds on the Eta Carinae Supernova… What dear? Oh nothing, just reading…

Technorati Tags: astrophotography, AstroTrac TT320, observing, portable telescope drive, telescopes

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