That is one of three identical mounts I built. I have one, two were sold. It's the subject of a piece I wrote for Sky & Telescope magazine some years ago, "A Weightless Woodshop Refractor", one of 3 articles I did for the magazine in my "Woodshop" series. It's my take on a Dobsonian refractor mount that uses the telescope's mass to maintain 3-bearing contact on the groundboard, rather than resorting to a counterweight. Just clever wordplay, not truly "weightless", lol. I think some kind of X-Y adjuster could be made sufficiently light so as not to be a concern. Alternatively, we could find a less massive guidescope. On Mon, Jun 16, 2008 at 10:43 PM, Canopus56 <canopus56@yahoo.com> wrote:

Chuck, Thanks for your kind words.

As to a somekind of replacement with a slo-mo control for the "U" bar that holds on the Mak, weight would be problem for Bruce. I notice in "Jim's Album" in the gallery, this item, titled "Chuck Hard's weightless mount" -

http://gallery.utahastronomy.com/main.php?g2_itemId=5478