The design unites highest esthetic demands as well as a maximum request for stability and strength. Also Mountegra`s flare displays reliability and that`s what it`s capable to offer!
Materials:
Aluminum ensures rigidity in those places where it is asked for with a thickness of up to 20 mm - this porvides the mount with high stability where it is necessary: at the bearing and it`s housing and at both arms, the vertical and horizontal one. The gear is made of the finest bronze, the worm made of high-grade steel.
Adaptive fork mount:
representing the worldwide first most intelligent innovation in mountdesing, Mountegra offers it`s users fully adaptable mountarms, that is the horizontal and vertical arm.
This means that one can move the horizontal arm in an extent of 20 cm of amplitude in it`s RA fixation so that the main center of gravity happens to be projected exaxtly over the base plate. One checks this with a torque key (provided by Gemini) which becomes connected directly to the worm (while the drive system is not activated!). the value read on the display must be equal in the two directions of rotation. Once this is done optimal balance is achieved successfully. there is no need for any counterweighs.
After this the telescope is to be moved in a 90° position (so that the scopes longitudinal axis is orientated widly horizontally) and the scopes are moved forward and backward in their tuberings until one reads equality with the torque key attached to the worm again.
Furthermore the vertical arm can also be pulled out in a range of 20 cm so that one can accomplish obervation in the most comfortable way!
The elegant 3 - part handle (found on the short arm edge) serves as a lever for to adjust the mount horizontally and vertically as described above.
Polar alignment:
According to the illustrations the screws which hold the mount down to the baseplate which is supposed to be attached to the pier can be completely opened up - don`t worry - Mountegra and the scopes will stand still as a rock and will definately not move anywhere! The common center of gravity (mount and scopes) remains in all cases exactly inside the base plate!
To adjust the azimut and the polar hight in order to find a perfect polar alignment there are 2 wheels which display exact measurements in arcs of a second so U can easily make use of any polar alignment procedure U want. If U calculate the misalignment in some 2,5 arc minutes e.g. U just turn the wheel until this amount has been reached!
Mountegra is best driven with Pulsar. This guiding system is the most appropriate for any Gemini mount. it was dedicatedly created for Gemini mounts.
Under a magnification of 500 I already tested Mountegra`s reliabilty in tracking. Mountegra shows a completely pure drive without any pendulum faults, without any jumps or fluctuations, ...! A most satisfying performance in tracking! Maximum goto speed is 3°/sec. a higher rate is possible but not recommended by Gemini.
If one bumps the mount on any place U like while observing with 500 mag, the picture swings for only some tenth of a seconds up to at most 2 seconds !
first Light photography:
7-4-2006: Set-up: TeleVue 0.8 Reducer and 9 " TMB on SXV M25C. Guiding tests with SX Guidecam attached to 4" tmb prime focus.
There is absolutely no backlash in RA. In Decl. there is some - which can easily be corrected by making use of Pulsar`s software routine where U just enter the amount of backlashtime in seconds. When tracking speed is activated there will never be any delay in guiding impulses given by the guidecontroll software! Functionally there is no backlash in decl, too! The Guideing works completely without any problems and reliably. The stars remained pin point like even at exposure times up to 20 minutes.
first results can be seen here. the odds were bad: moon being high up in the sky. Transp 2-3/10 and seeing 3-4/10.
Unfortunately, Jupiter was only some 22° over the horizon. even though the moons were visible as marvelous disks. Clearly restricted and different in size and and brightness.
