EQ3 Hyper Tune
Вставка
- Опубліковано 16 тра 2022
- Skywatcher EQ 3 PRO or equivalent mount upgrade.
Casual instructional video about upgrading your telescope mount for better guiding.
Replacing plastic and fibre washers with needle thrust bearings.
Materials
White lithium grease.
All measurements mm (inner/outter/thickness)
Needle Thrust bearing(part nr where I bought them)
1x AXK1024-A (10/24/2)
1x AXK2035-A (20/35/2)
1x AXK2542-A (25/42/2)
1x AXK3047-A (30/47/2)
1x AXK3552-A (35/52/2)
4 ball bearings (for worm gear) (6/13/5)
Bearing Washers
1x AS1024 (10/24/1)
2x AS2035 (20/35/1)
1 AS2542 (25/42/1)
Ball Bearings
4x Common washer (5/10/0.5) (or around there)
www.remlagret.se is where I bought my bearings: www.remlagret.se/collections/... - Ігри
I had actually watched this video a year ago right before I bought the EQM35pro, it was what offered me hope of mechanical upgrade to a pretty tidy mount per $ to the quality. So a year in nearly, and due to the excessive astronomy addiction of additions and upgrades to the weight I find myself teetering near limits and had to backtrack. And then the mount went wonky.
and after the standard rebuild, grease and backlash battle (very easy, very doable for anyone inclined when using this video) I found myself ordering roller bearings last night to the specs you've posted for versions 1 and 2 except the ball bearings which are next. I did get myself down to 57-80 rms with standard tweaks, but they never really cured the dec stiffness completely even at peak tweak. So, Much appreciated my good man! I look forward to seeing if anything better can come from this replacement. (p.s. I actually found two(2) fibre washers in my dec bottom which was either a mistake or compensation so...bearings it is. many thanks.
Good luck! I helped a person with an EQ35 and it worked great but I had to put a small washer over one of the axles to keep the bearing centered. I 3D printed one but anything that holds it in place woks. That washer will not take any load at all. Result was excellent.
Two filter washers makes me think it was intentional to match the wormgear height wise.
@@PetterAstromInstalled today, WOW! I could rent out the RA as a Fair ride it spins so freely, everythingmeshed there perfectly, The DEC I couldnt replace that bottom fibre washer but finagled a working order that removed about 80% of the binding. Well worth every penny. Thanks for your wonderful upgrade direction. what a difference! you would think for the extra 50$ in parts Skywatcher would just do the right thing and install them themselves. But here we are.😆
I know! Huge difference. On the DEC you might actually want to tighten the the final nut (inside the polar scope area) a bit more just to create a bit of extra friction. That will keep it a bit stiffer in the wind.
Dear Petter, Thanks a lot for this nice video with all this great details and tips. I have just completed the tasks for the first time on my EQM-35 Pro bought in Feb-2021. Which worked fine for me up to beginning of this year when I tried to use it with PHD2 for guiding instead of my MGEN3 and could not get any calibration on DEC completed. I looked more in detail and found a lot of backlash and stiffness on the DEC axis while the RA seemed still to be ok but also with some Backlash. When I discovered your Youyube video I decided to do the maintence / tunung myself as none of the astronomy dealer here in France does want to mess with an EQM-35 Pro. I followed precisly your video having boght before the parts on your list. The only two things I found difficult was the fact that for my mount I could not implement option 2 as they must have changed the design of the parts slighty and with a large beering I could not find on both sides plane surfaces and had no room to put two washers on each side of the bearing. I went for option 1 and rinded the inside of the bearing a bit to get it passing over the axe without the need of heating each time. On DEC I also did not find yet a solution to replace all the caroon washers and I had to leave the last washer before screwing the nut on the axe fianly because otherwise there was not enough room to get the nut properly tightened without loosening when turning the axe with the cludge dis-engaged. I have done some photos ant put it on my facebook account and want to thank you again and encourage all other EQM-35 users too consider this maintannce / tune. I saw another video where only the de-tightening of the RA and DEC axe screws were described plus the procedure to loosen/tighten the RA/DEC adjystment screws. The guy said all other things will not lead to much more improvment, but having done all now OI think this is not true. In particular the cleaning of all the old cheap grase and replacing most of the bearings leads in my mind for a significant improvment that both axes tur smoothly in all positions. I tried first just to do without cleaning and flet a lot of irregular resistances in both axes when trying to turn and adjsust the screws. I was not possible to find an adjustment settings that the mount axes had neither a backklash nor a gripping point on a 360 Deg turn. This changed when I had done the full procedure you described in your video and I think this is well worth as it minimizes irregularities. Thanks again and clear skies which I am waiting for to quantify the success of my efforts with a PHD2 guide graph. But I am quied confident that PHD2 will now calibrate and guide my EQM-35Pro and even better as the MGEN3 did.
Thank you for your report!
I did an EQ35 a while ago and there are some minor differences. But over all he could not either finish a PHD2 calibration before. After this mod he has had great success with really good guiding. 👍
All this makes a lot of sense to me, because a short while back a guy who owned and imaged with the EQ3 pro, said that with PHD2 guiding, there seemed to be a LOT of backlash etc and the guiding was really poor. I think it would be wise for all owners of mounts, even the HEQ5 pro ( which I own and use ) to do at the very least an inspection and re-greasing/tuning of all internal components, seeing as it's likely even the more expensive mounts will use very cheap low quality parts and grease?
Peter thanks for your inspiring video, greetings from Athens 👍
🙏🏻 ☺️
Thanks for great tutorial. Just a side note, worm gears bearing are 628-6-ZZ-SKF (if SKF is preferred), I have EQM-35 PRO but same ball bearing size.
Thanks for that info!
Hi Martin, I also have the eqm 35 pro and want to replace the bearings on the worm drive and the red washers with needle thrust. I can't find any sizes and would rather have them purchased in advance of stripping it down. Do you happen to know this info? Bearing sizes for both worm drives and dimensions of all of the red washers? Many thanks! Rob.
@@robrenwick2366 Hi Rob, I am listing these bearings for you below and also how many I used. But before I do so, I must say that I faced huge troubles, mainly with RA axis. I am not 100% sure that bearings caused thise issues, but I am pretty sure they did. Or, not actually bearings, but rather missing washers in the video. The tutorial shows using needle thrust bearings without proper washers. Each such bearing needs to be used with its washer (while bearings code is AXK, washers are AS). These are also mentioned at the end of the video, but are not always used. The very last bearing used (1024) is ok without washers but the rest I strongly recommend using thise washers from both sides of the bearing. But it causes bigger gaps in the mount. Imagine, in RA axis you use 2 bearings, each 2mm + 4 washers - another 4mm. These replace this red washers. My problem occured in RA only although I think the same, but less problematic, happened in DEC axis too, however at that moment I didn't know and somehow I managed to remove the problem without washers (I am currently hiking in Bortle 2 so as soon as I return in couple of days I think I will redo DEC too. And what happened? After a couple of turns, RA axis get stiff and with each turn it was worse and worse and finally it wasn't even possible to move at all, not even to strip it apart. It took enormous power to get cylinder out. And cylinder didn't fit back on both parts. It was scratched, also inner part of the opposite side where it goes in, was scratched too. I first thought it is the small button in the clutch, but it turned ou, that bearings without washers caused wobbling of the cylinder. So I had to sand both parts - cylinder and the part to which cylinder is inserted and finally using steel wool I made it nice and smooth again. I had to repeat this process 2-3 times until I realized that this is the problem. Although it looks everything flat inside the mount, it most probably isn't and anyway even if it is, using just bearing is not ideal. Now everything works fine, smooth and easy. If you need more info, find me on FB messenger - Maros Babiak, and we can chat more over there.
Edit, I forgot to list bearings :) So here they are, I used these:
- 4x SKF W628/6-2Z
- 1x AKX1024 (SKF)
- 1x AKX2035-A/0-10 (vyrobca INA)
- 2x or 3x AKX2542-A/0-10 (INA) - I cannot remember if I used 2 or 3
- 1x AKX3552-A/0-10 (INA)
and
- 2x AS2035
- 2x AS2542
- 2x AS3552
@@embeathome1 dude thanks for your time and detailed reply, I'm in the same page with eqm 35 and now I'm little bit concerned on tuning the mount 🤔 I will talk to you on messenger
@Martin Babiak i 've sent you a message over fb messenger :)
DId the upgrade with excellent results in both RA and DEC, DEC seems to be around 0.5-0.6 now and RA around 0.8 but also have some sudden spikes every now and then.. meaning i have to make RA movement more smooth or check for stiffnes! thanks once again for your video :)
Thank you for letting us know it worked for you too! Short spikes might be a grain of dirt in the gears. Also my first guess would be the worm gear ballbearings.
@@PetterAstrom you might be right about the spikes, ball-bearings were the only thing that didn't change due to high cost (4 x W 628/6 2Z SKF = 85 euros), maybe be I have to try changing only the RA and see how it goes 😉
This is awesome, I have Arsenal EQ3-2, so now i know what to do)
Good luck! I got great results!
I have a eq3 pro, was literally thinking of doing this with thrust bearings (I’m an engineer) to see if it would help 👍🏼 then this pops up…awesome work sir 👍🏼 i get 0.7 guiding as it is (I’ve used good oil in places) but I’ve always wondered if I could get it lower 👍🏼 I’m gonna try this 👍🏼 nice one dude 👍🏼
Sounds like you have a great starting point. Good luck if you proceed!
Thank you for this very detailed guide!
Good luck if you decide to do it yourself!
Brilliant stuff mate, this vid gave me an interesting idea ;)
Please share if it turns out to be a good idea ☺️
IMHO:
I think there are no need to use bearings between body (parts with brakes) and metal cylinders, because during guiding - they are blocked with brakes. Bearings just need between metal cylinder and moving parts.
Sorry for my english, I hope you understand me.
You might be right about that, but it really helps with balancing. 🙂
Good video
Thinking of getting one of these mounts. I know you have made mods to yours but considering the price it looks pretty well designed
For a lighter rig, absolutely!
@@PetterAstrom Most likely to carry a ED80 for visual grab and go setup.
Super nice video! Thank you for adding all the parts and instructions. I just finished this myself, and indeed the mount feels so much smoother than before. For my particular mount, there was so much play before, that it is now incomparably better. I do have one lingering question: on the Dec axis, if I push gently on my telescope, I can feel some small wobble. When I had the mount apart, as you did, I removed the play entirely in the worm gear assembly. I have repeated this several times, and it seems no amount of gear adjustment removes the wobble, even when overtightening it intentionally. I am wondering if this is intrinsic to the design, and maybe the motor mount bracket is flexing a little bit or the gears just have an imperfect mesh. Do you have the same problem? I'm not sure if it is something that will really effect guiding performance or not.
I know what you mean.
There could be several causes besides the worm gear alignement. The nut holding the axle together (inside the polar scope hole) needs to be tight enough. This will not remove the wobble but minimize the effect of it. If it doesnt, you might want to check the worm gear axlr so there is no play in the worm gear axle left-right. If there is, adjust with the nuts behind the gearwheel.
Also make sure the initial set of gear wheels directly on the motor are well adjusted. I had some play there.
When adjusting something, always make sure you can rotate it freely afterwards.
Greetings from San Diego! My EQM-35 Pro has started failing PHD Calibration in DEC. I found your video while looking for help. Thanks to you, I have bearings on order, and a disassembled mount in my future! :-) After watching your video, I feel confident that I can do a similar rebuild. The only question I have is "What are bearings part numbers (or size/shape) you recommend for the worm gear? Your "ball bearings" table entry shows 6/13/5, but no part number, so I am not exactly sure what to order. If you could clarify that, I would be much obliged. Thanks again for taking the time to share such great and practical knowledge with the community.
Hello! Yeah,this works for the 35 version too, but I believe I had to make a 3D printed ring to keep the bearing centered in one of the axles because the bearing inner diameter was a little too big. Simply keep the original if you encounter this.
I do not have a parts number for that bearing. Part number is local and differed from manufacturers but as long as you buy something from a trusted brand I would not worry.
Many thanks for this tutorial! In you case what weight/setup did you had when guiding at 0.7/0.5 arcsec/pix? I'm wandering if with this improvements with manage to increase the useful payload if the mount for astrophotography? Best regards and thanks again.
I used a skywatcher 150 pds with astrocamera, guide scope, guide cam and focus motor. 7,5 kg. I would say yes, it increases the weight up to a point.
@@PetterAstrom Thanks for your reply. It's increadible that you are able to guide that well with so much payload. I have the same setup and will measure my guiding the next time :-)
Really nice video, I used it to tune my EQM-35. I had some crazy binding on the RA axis, also mentioned by others in the comments, so I had to grease the RA clutch shaft, but I think its fine :)
Mind linking to the swedish webshop you used? I am in Denmark, so I think shipping should be cheap :)
Hi! Link will be added shortly.
Found it! I bought mine at remlagret.se (www.remlagret.se/collections/axialnalkrans)
hi petter i have sat and watched your very informative video do you know if the eq 3 and the eq 3/2 are the same internal dimensions many thanks for any advice
Hi! Yes, same dimensions.
I have an old CG-4, one of those without the saddle plate. I once cleaned it, but now I have to do it all again and try to replace the washers with bearings. Not sure if axles diameters are the same.
I have no ide I´m afraid. But it is quite easy to measure the fibre washers and order bearings that would work. Good luck!
Peter, what is your washer size (or part number) that you used at 44:15? So you first used a washer, after this the rubber part then a bearing and then your washer at the end?
Hi! I ended up not using the rubber washers at all. The metal washer is same dimension as the needle thrust bearing. Also I had to put the nut on upside down because the axle with the threads was a bit shorter after putting the bearings in.
@@PetterAstrom thanks for the update! So you ended up using the initial washer (coming with mount) then the needle thrust bearing, then your thinner washer (I believe is the same dimensions as the thrust bearing so 1024, and then nut?
at about 14mins in it looks like your tightening the grub screw when you said you were loosening. Is that correct?
Hi, sorry for late answer. That center hex screw actually tightens the gear when you loosen it. I am turning anti clockwise (to loosen the hex screw) and that will make the gears push towards each other.
Hei, Petter - thanks for a great how-to video. I'll tune my 3-2 for sure after seeing this. One question, though: Did you finally find a suitable thrust needle roller for that last red washer-type "bearing"?
Hi! Nope, I could not find a good size :-)
@@PetterAstrom En fråga till, bara: You specified white lithium grease - will not "ordinary" lithium grease - from, say, Biltema - suffice?
I did some research and with a little grinding/filing to the inside (.030") NTA1220 should work. I have some on order, I'll let you know.... Dec. 22...Well, these bearings arrived today and with a little grinding on the bore they fit over the shaft, but after making them fit, and looking at how the mount operates, this position doesn't need a bearing, it only moves when you unlock the clutch and it not part of the motion when tracking. The red fiber washer is fine in this position. The same goes for the AXK3552 bearing sitting on top of the worm wheel housing on the RA, that bearing is not used when tracking as the housing is locked by the clutch, the red fiber washer there is fine. You just need bearings at the ends of the shafts. Cheers
@@hapestrsåg din försågs nu först! Jag köpte i en annan butik men tillverkare var CRC och det har fungerat i alla väder.
@@kilohertz684They do help a lot when balancing though, and if you have a heavy scope on balancing is very important! Thanks for the feedback!
Hello Petter, I did some research and found what could be the correct bearing to replace the AXK2542 and not require any grinding. It's a TC1625, 1" bore (25.4mm) and 1 9/16" outer dia. (40mm). I just ordered some from Amazon Canada, should be here next week. I'll confirm they work without modification when I receive them. Paul
Oh! Interesting! Please let us know!
@@PetterAstrom Hi Petter, All the bearings except for one just arrived from Amazon and the TC1625 (NTA1625) does indeed fit perfectly, the bearing slides right over the housing, the washers or backing plates, 3 out of the 10 slid right on, the others will need a tiny bit of sanding, just .005" or so. I could force it over the shaft but then it warps. The housing measures 25.45mm and the washers are 1" so just a tiny bit to remove. You may get lucky with a different supplier. Merry Christmas
Thank you and I wish you a happy new year!
Bra video! Vad kostade alla lager när du köpte? Ser dyrt ut nu när jag kollade 😅
Tjenare. Runt 500kr har jag för mig.
amazing job and a great upgrade to the mount! Would you consider adding belt drives? I would give that a try! I wonder if this shop could send it the parts to Estonia.. Could you share their website please?
Hello. Belt drive to the EQ3 mount is not available as far as I know.
You should be able to get the bearings in Estonia. No need to ship them. Just use the same dimensions as in the description.
@@PetterAstrom Got it, did it - all is working much smoother! thank you so much. Regarding the belt drives - i found them. What do you think?
@@PhoenixTheChannel you found a belt drive kit for the EQ3? Can you post a link?
@@PetterAstrom do you see the link below? For some reason the link keeps disappearing.
If not - here is the name: Asterion EQ3 Drive Kit Pro
i use to have a eq5 and did the hypertune on that , could the red fibre washers be replaced with teflon washers( the 2 you cant get the metal bearings )
They probably can. I don’t know how they will perform though.
morning Petter, was wondering what is the heaviest telescope you can image with on your eq3? Thank you.
Hi! I used a Skywatcher 150 PDS with filter wheel, camera, motor for the focuser, guide scope and guide camera. Sometimes also a two inch glass Barlow. It was wind sensitive but rightly balanced it worked great. I don’t remember exactly, but I think my telescope was close to 8 kg.
Where did you bought them, I can't see to find the sizes you describe
I bought them from an online store in Sweden, but maybe you have to convert the sizes to imperial instead of metric to order if you live in UK or USA etc?
Great instructions and explaining but sadly i cant seem to get the dec backlash fixed. Ive been fiddling around with the screws that adjust the wormgear(including the small grub screw in the middle), and if i want to minimize the backlash, the wormgear wont spin smoothly(with the mount put together). If i want the wormgear to spin smoothly the backlash will be huge. Cant seem to find the problem. Any help would pe much appreciated
Hi. That is interesting. What mount do you have?
Also, as soon as yoi put the motor on the motor will make that axle quite stiff. But you say that you CAN loosen it up so I guess this is not that.
Did you remember to put some small washers underneath the worm gear assembly before putting it back after mounting the needle thrust bearing? That is crucial.
Check 11:15, notice the small washers. Ypu need to makes sure the worm gear and crown gear mesh properly at the same height and also the evenly left right (carefully tighten both bolts left and right of the grub screw the same ammount and little by little) do not tighten one all the way and then the next.
@@PetterAstrom Hi, thank you for responding.I have the same mount. Yes, i did put the small washers under the worm gear, but what i believe i was doing wrong was tightening one of the screws on the wormgear all the way and then tightening the other. Also i think its the worm gear assembly moving around so ill check that and tighten the assembly.
Ok so ive found something out, when i take the dec axis out and look for play in the wormgear and the big gear connected to the dec axis( i dont know how its called ) theres 0 play and the gear turns very smooth but when i but the dec back into the mount the play comes back
@@PetterAstrom I think I found the problem. The part that you talk about at 10:15 that goes over the dec axis shaft, moves around a little bit while its on the shaft creating play. When i had the dec assembly off the mount and spinning the wormgear, because there is no force pushing onto the part you cant actually feel the play. But when i have it on the mount with the clutch engaged the part can wiggle around in the dec shaft. Hopefully you can understand what im trying to point out here
Thank you for your sharing, but I still want to know the size of the three bearings used on the RA axis.（20:50, 22:01, 24:51）🙃
Oh, this was a long time ago, I cannot remember what bearing was used where, but the bearings are very cheap, if you buy half of them the shipping might be more then the whole lot. The worm gear bearings are not so cheap though.
Thank you for your answer. I will try to solve it！
I have eqm35pro , based on eq3-2....do you think all parts Will fit in eqm35pro?
I am also wondering....one of us has to give it a try ;) I tried to search for strip down of EQM35 but didn't find anything...
I have stripped and tuned my EQM-35 and the DEC looks exactly the same except you can separate the DEC from the RA section. The RA is a bit different. Larger and finer gear and worm, the motor mounts slightly different and with 2 bolts. I had a harder time getting the motors and reduction gear aligned well and almost backlash free than anything in the main mount. Especially the DEC motor needs a 3rd hand to install well. It is pivoting and wiggling around on that single bolt while you try to tighten it in a perfect position. My mount also had the DEC worm drive gear installed to far out and the motor mount couldn’t get into the correct position until I moved that gear closer to the mount. Fiddly, precision work the requires patience but not actually hard to do. The improvement was very noticeable and worth the afternoon spent. I used a synthetic grease with PTFE but I live in a cold climate and wanted the lower temp rating.
@@jml7916 thanks for sharing
@@jml7916 really glad you made it, i'm struggling these days to adjust the DEC motor properly, can you please be a little more specific what did you take into account and should do,, could you be describe with a photo or something? thanks
@@stelaras1 can’t post pictures here. Are you on cloudy nights forum?
how does the white grease perform in the cold? does it get stiff?
It does not. Worked great. I’ve used my mounts in -15 C.
The problem in really cold conditions is rather that the aluminum shrinks making all adjustments too tight. Loosening the worm gear a tiny bit fixes that.
@@PetterAstrom Thanks, I'm probably going to tune my mount. Currently unguided getting 30 second subs with my 130PDS, I need to get guiding. Should I get guiding first or hypertune?
I'd also like to add I was originally using a manual EQ3, which now is motorized and belt driven with OnStep. Performs great
Amazing finding you both here and on Astrobiscuits discord server🎉
las arandelas rojas q trae de serie no se venden ??
I actually don’t know, I am switching because of the much better performance of the bearings instead of red washers.
Hi Peter do you think that after this upgrade the mount can handle 130 newtonian from skywatcher
Or 150
@@PhotoGrapheeshi! With good balancing, yes absolutely. It is not ideal though, bigger mount=less wind sensitive.
I used mine with a Skywatcher 150 pad with heavy camera, guide scope etc. when the conditions were good, I guided at 0.5 total RMS.
I want to apply lube on eqm 35 mount can i follow this tut for tearing down the mount
Hello! Yes you can. I helped a fellow astrophotographer with his EQ35. I did have to print a plastic washer in order for tone of the bearings to stay centered. I cannot remember what position though.
@@PetterAstrom That's a great idea.
Can the mount handle a 6in dob 10lbs with hyper tune?
Hi! If it can? Yes but would I recommend it? No! Even if it can support the weight of the scope, then you will want a camera, guidescooe, coma corrector filterwheel etc. then you will be faaar better of with a eq5 type mount.
Du är svensk 😂😂😂
Jodå 🤪
I would like to apologize but I doubt total RMS error of 0.46" per axis. It is hardly possible even with Eq6. May I ask for exact guiding setup parameters ([camera type, guiding scope type] or [camera pixel size and guiding scope focal length])? I can see in your Phd2 screenshot ration 0.07px/0.46" what is 1px/6.6"... It is possible but you would had to use relatively uncommon very short guiding scope or guiding camera with relatively big pixels. Usual camera parameters are about 1px/3.5"and focal lenght about 200mm.
Total error 0.7" would be more believable (everything under 1" is great and even 1.5" is well usable) and still deeply under seeing conditions limits. It is miracle if you have really RMS error under 0.5".
Thank you for the great video.
Hi! Great questions! I have always had the same guiding cam, the ASI 224 MC. As for guiding scopes I used two different ones, first the SvBony 30 mm version with 125 mm focal length. But after a while, someonce said the same thing you just did so after that I got a 60 mm scope with 240 mm focal length. It did nothing to my guiding stats though, to my dissapointment. And guiding was reliably 0.8, but at those rare occations, on both guidescopes, I could get around 0.5 total RMS.
Люфт на червяке регулировать не умеет и делает всё неправильно .
I do not know what you mean. My EQ3 guided extremely well after this upgrade. Sometimes as low as 0.5 arc seconds per pixel.
I can't figure out why people buy shit that needs to be fixed right out of the box. Makes no sense.
There's always one tube on a UA-cam video commentary. Perhaps some people can't afford an Eq8 yet love the hobby. Diy astronomy/astrophotography is also another hobby too, that people like to do in their spare time
If everything was free sure. But the thing is, this is an expensive hobby, and when you get started and are not convinced you want to keep doing it, then a cheap rig is quite attractive. Also, you do not know what you need in the beginning. And here is a great little mount that can get you started, and with an hour or two of work and some cheap bearings can perform really really well. They are not broken though. Just not performing at their max capacity.
Do you have Instagram or twitter ? There’s some weird dec problem i have “ I didn’t hyper mod it “ The problem effect the RMS error it went from 1” to 20” ARC second
Nope, but I hang out at the astrobiscuit discord if you want to discuss your problem.
@@PetterAstrom yes !! i'm a member in this server @MARS#9487