So I ordered some clamshell rings to get away from the 3-point ring setup, and the risk of flexure. The ADM 3-point rings are just awesome, but I wanted to try a piggy-back setup with the new triplet refractor and guidescope to get away from the side-by-side stuff. The clamshell rings say ‘TMB’ on them and they’re real high-quality, so I guess Astro-Tech acquired them in bulk from TMB at some point.
Below you’ll see the triplet mounted in the clamshells, with a 7″ ADM vixen dovetail bar screwed in atop the clamshells. Then, two small vixen dovetails clamp to that rail, and they each have the 3-point ADM rings attached above. Since the Orion shorttube 80 guidescope and SSAG plus 3-point rings weigh nearly nothing, I’m not worried as much about flexure with that. With the Parsec, the Orion motorized filter wheel, and the heavy motorized MoonLite focuser on the triplet, I needed rigidity down below.
One of the coolest things about this setup is that I can use the mini-dovetail knobs to remove the guidescope without changing the setup of the 3-point rings, and slide it right on the top long vixen dovetail bar on the AT8RC. No more flipping between mini-dovetail clamps and vixen rail as I have been doing up until now.
Lastly, the Losmandy plate the clamshells will attach to arrives tomorrow, hopefully the space between the holes sets up right. I’ll add to this post tomorrow when it arrives.
Here are some pictures:
