Tele Vue Alt-Az Mounts: Tele-Pod, Panoramic
and Gibraltar
Tele Vue scopes and mounts: TV-60 on Tele-Pod, TV-76 on Panoramic, NP-127
on Gibraltar 5.
I remember the first time I saw a Tele Vue
Panoramic mount. It was back in the late Nineties when goto
was really getting going. I had started looking for information on Tele Vue
telescopes, imagining another computer-filled techno wonder.
When I first saw a photo of a Panoramic, I was
surprised. Pictured with a Pronto, I loved the elegant simplicity and the
courage of Tele Vue in marketing premium scopes and mounts with no electronics
at all. I personally hadn’t owned an altaz mount
since I was about 12, so the idea was a bit of a shock, but when I thought
about it, it made perfect sense. For a grab-and-go scope what you want is
something you can just use quickly and intuitively, almost the way you do
binoculars. And being made of just aluminium and wood and brass, if I looked
after it this thing would last the rest of my life (and maybe beyond); I found
that attractive too.
So I bought a Panoramic, which now holds the
distinction of being the piece of astro gear I owned
longest (well apart from a 70’s Erfle 20mm eyepiece).
I have since owned all the other versions of this mount, so I’m reviewing them
as a group.
Design and Build
Note: The
head on the Panoramic is the same head you also find on the Tele-Pod and the
Gibraltar; only the tripods and labels differ. The Gibraltar 5, made expressly
for the NP127, is a bit different and I have added a section about it at the
end. Also different is the original ‘Upswing’ mount that looks the same but had
no azimuth bearing – you had to supply your own by mounting it on a photo head.
The Tele-Pod head works like a large
spotting-scope head. There are no slow motion
controls; it’s about as simple as it could be. To use it, you just push the
scope around in altitude and azimuth, either using the handle provided or with
the OTA itself.
The Tele-Pod difference is in the way it
works. Instead of sitting on the
mount, the scope rests in the Tele-Pod
head, in a swinging cradle. This lowers the centre of gravity and reduces (but
not eliminates) that horrible tendency in spotting scope heads to suddenly let
go and bang the scope on the tripod. Properly balanced, even when loose, the
Tele-Pod cradle just sits in place.
The cradle pivots in a pair of smooth brass
altitude bearings set in a shallow fork that rotates on another bearing. All
the bearings have tension adjustment by knurled knobs; on the altitude bearings
these are made of solid brass. The fork and cradle are fabricated from finely
cut and machined aluminium plate finished in black anodising. The parts are
held together by recessed allen bolts. It’s an
elegant piece of engineering.
All the Tele Vue mounts have two holes in the
side of the fork on each side to accept Tele Vue’s eyepiece brackets. These
brackets are an (inexpensive) accessory, but highly recommended as they hold
three 1.25” EPs and two 2” eyepieces on the mount, allowing you to securely
combine mount, scope and eyepieces into a grab-and-go portable observatory.
Tele Vue provide digital setting circle encoders
and a computer with a 2000-object database for the Tele-Pod head in a package
called “Sky Tour” that isn’t a goto (you still have
to push), but tells you where to go to find an object and also tells you what
you’re pointed at. It requires a two-star alignment. The encoders attach to pre-drilled
holes in the mount head. I haven’t
tried it.
The base of the fork is threaded to fit any
photo tripod, with both 3/8 and ¼-20 threads built in. Two holes in the cradle
are provided that match all Tele Vue clamshells and ring plates and some other
small scopes too (Stellarvue clamshells, for
example). Other scopes will need adapter plates.
Tele Vue don’t advertise the fact, but the Tele-Pod
head is the same whichever tripod you buy it on and the Panoramic and Gibraltar
tripods just screw on with different adapters. Only the labels on the altitude
bearings differ between the mounts. So you could buy
just one head and attach it to one of several different tripods, depending on
your scope and application. The main difference, then, between the three
different mounts is the tripod. We’ll
look at each in turn.
Update 2019: Tele Vue now seem to have
replaced their bespoke wooden tripods with similar models from the German
company Berlebach, whilst the folding Tele-Pod tripod
still seems much like the one reviewed here. I have other Berlebach
products that are excellent, so this move makes sense, but I haven’t tried the
Tele Vue branded Berlebachs.
Tele Vue Panoramic Mount
The Panoramic has a light weight wooden tripod
made either of ash or walnut, the latter with brass fittings. The tripod has a centre tray and attaches to
the head with a push-fitting (which you can buy separately to adapt a generic Tele-Pod
head, if you buy them separately).The Panoramic is very light and easily
portable and extends to a good height, allowing standing viewing even for a 6
footer. The Panoramic is designed for TeleVue’s
smaller OTAs (Pronto, TV76, TV85), but works OK with the NP101 at medium
powers, just as TeleVue promise.
An early version lacked the threads for eyepiece
holders and Sky Tour, whilst the tripod had a splitter instead of the centre tray
– see below.
TV76 and
Panoramic – pretty and functional.
Early
walnut-and-brass Panoramic with Tele Vue Renaissance.
Tele Vue Tele-Pod Mount
Confusingly, the generic Tele Vue head – used on
all three mounts - is called the Tele-Pod head, even if you buy it on its own.
But you can buy it with a specific lightweight tripod designed for TV’s
smallest scopes like the Ranger or TV-60.
The Tele-Pod tripod is made of tubular
aluminium insulated from knocks by foam and the whole thing is finished in
satin black. It is very light weight. The legs are in just two sections and
adjust with twist collars that are much easier to use than the clamps usually
found on photo tripods.
Like a photo tripod, the Tele-Pod tripod has
an extending centre pillar with a 3/8 inch bolt on the
top. The legs are tensioned to fold in
on their own when you lift it up and for this reason there is no eyepiece tray.
I thought these things were design flaws at first, but that was my
misunderstanding.
The Tele-Pod tripod isn’t nearly as nice to
look at as the furniture-quality Panoramic and Gibraltar, but has a couple of
tricks that the wooden tripods can’t match. For one thing, the legs are much
easier to adjust for length, but you don’t need to do that as much anyway, due
to the extending centre post. The centre post is incredibly handy for ensuring
that the eyepiece always remains at the perfect height: it works very well for
the TV-60 with the post extended, but doesn’t feel quite as safe with the TV-76;
you wouldn’t want to use the centre post with a heavier OTA.
The final clever feature of the Tele-Pod
tripod is those self-folding legs. True they can trap you fingers, but the big
advantage is that you don’t have to manoeuvre a tripod out of the door. Just
hold by one leg with scope tucked under the arm, let the other legs fold in,
open the door with your free hand and walk out! Again, it’s the TV-60 that
works best in this mode and makes for the most portable setup I have tried.
Tele-Pod
with TV60 – the best grab-n-go setup I’ve tried.
Tele-Pod:
grab... and go!
TV-76 is
less ideal on the Tele-Pod tripod.
Tele Vue Gibraltar Mount
The Gibraltar is the heaviest of the mounts
and designed for the 4” TeleVue scopes, the NP-101
and NP-102. It attaches the Tele-Pod head by a long 3/8” stud through top of
the tripod. The tripod itself is of chunky ash or walnut (but without brass
accents this time) and looks the best of the three. It’s still just about light
enough to pick up and walk outside with, including the telescope and a couple
of eyepieces. The same tripod is also used for the heavy-duty Gibraltar 5 mount
described below.
Ash
Gibraltar with a tele Vue NP-101.
Using the Tele-Pod Head on a photo tripod
Your final option is to buy the Tele-Pod head
separately and attach it to any sturdy photo tripod via the ¼-20 or 3/8
threaded holes in the base. I once had one attached to a big Manfrotto and this made for a very flexible and portable
mount due to the sturdiness and infinite adjustability of the tripod, which was
designed for heavy cameras.
Tele Vue Gibraltar 5 Mount
This is a completely different head that
attaches to the standard Gibraltar tripod and is designed for use with bigger
OTAs (specifically the NP-127). The design is basically the same as the Tele-Pod,
but everything is bigger, even the gauge of aluminium used. The azimuth bearing
is much larger and quite stiff to turn on its own, but with the NP-127
installed it feels just right. The altitude bearings are bigger too. Attachment
of an OTA is via the familiar pair of bolt holes, just like the Tele-Pod and
the head goes on the tripod using a long 3/8 stud, just like the smaller Tele-Pod
does. Interestingly, Tele Vue have retained the ability to remove the stud and
screw the Gib 5 onto a photo tripod (but it would have to be a big one).
Gibraltar
5 with NP-127.
Gibraltar
5: Designed for the NP-127, but the Sky-Watcher ED120 Equinox bolts straight on
and looks gorgeous.
In Use - The Night Sky
The Tele-Pod head, attached to whichever
tripod, makes a very good way to sweep for clusters and DSOs at low powers and
it’s my opinion that this was really what it was designed for. It’s also an
excellent support for terrestrial viewing.
At medium powers, the Tele-Pod head is generally
fine too – smooth and easy. However, at high powers it can be another story. A
lot depends on the OTA you’re using.
Surprisingly, longer OTAs can be easier to
control at high powers. Very short OTAs like the TV-76 don’t have enough
leverage to overcome “stiction” in the bearings. When you nudge the mount to
compensate for Earth’s rotation, you end up nudging too far and losing the
object.
Wide-field
eyepiece designs, like Naglers and Ethos, work well
for high powers on Tele-Pod mounted scopes simply because you don’t have to
nudge as often.
The other problem with short telescopes is
that they are very sensitive to balance point and if you are not careful with
the tension on the bearings, the head can tip forward or back when you swap
eyepieces. This can lead to a most unpleasant “donk” as the front of the scope
hits the cover for the azimuth axis, but at least that cover is made of Delrin plastic,
so it doesn’t mark the tube.
The TV-60 and Range don’t suffer so much from
these problems. They are easy to balance on their sliding bar and can’t take
the heavy 2” eyepieces anyway.
The Panoramic and Gibraltar work very
similarly, with the beefier Gibraltar legs absorbing vibrations better for high
powers, as claimed. One slight criticism is that the varnish seems a bit thin
on both tripods: the ash-wood can get marked with dew and water drops after a
while. A regular dose of furniture wax helps to prevent this.
The Gibraltar 5 does a good job of coping with
bigger OTAs and is commendably smooth when nudging to track. In fact, it works
better than the Tele-Pod in most situations, perhaps due to the extra leverage
and momentum of the heavier tube.
However, there was an initial problem with large amplitude, low frequency
oscillations that took ages to settle. I was able to all but cure this by
adjusting the three dome-headed allen screws that the
mount rests on, so they all contacted the base. However, the Gibraltar 5/NP-127
still vibes more than is ideal and again it works best for lower to medium
powers, sweeping for clusters and DSOs with intuitive ease.
A grab-n-go 5” refractor take your fancy? With
the NP-127/Gibraltar 5 it’s possible (just)!
Summary
I still like TeleVue’s
altaz mounts for their elegance and simplicity. My
favourite of the mounts reviewed here is the Tele-Pod, despite it being by far
the least prepossessing of the three alternatives to behold. Combine it with
the TV-60 and a couple of eyepieces, say a 13mm Nagler
T6 and a Nagler 3-6mm zoom, and you have the most
functional grab and go outfit I know of this side of binoculars.
The Gibraltar 5, once properly setup (see note
above), is stable for bigger OTAs at moderate powers and recommended. If you
like sweeping star fields at low powers, it’s highly recommended.
All the mounts are less than ideal for use at
high powers, in my opinion. It’s all too easy for a bit of stiction in the
bearings to make you overshoot and have to start over with a lower power.
Counter-intuitively, longer OTAs seem less prone to this problem. Mounts with
slow motion controls, like the Vixen Porta, are easier to use in this respect,
but less intuitive in others and certainly – and this matters,
though you’ll deny it – less classy looking in your living room or study!
Tele Vue’s range of alt-azimuth mounts are
highly recommended if you like sweeping for DSOs at low-medium powers. For
higher power observing they are a bit less ideal.