The Truth About Building an Astrophotography Rig

After months of research, planning, testing and troubleshooting, my brand new astrophotography rig is finally ready for first light. In this video I take you through the entire setup — including the mount, telescope, camera system, guiding setup, focuser problems, and all the mistakes and lessons learned while commissioning the rig over several nights. This is my sixth astrophotography rig, but even with experience there were still challenges to overcome: Guiding issues with a strain wave mount Off-axis guider setup problems Autofocuser slippage and backlash tuning Learning new software and hardware combinations Balancing portability with performance The setup includes: Askar SQA85 Proxisky UMI 20S mount PrimaLuceLab Eagle 6 Pro Player One Poseidon M Pro Antlia 3nm filters ZWO EAF Pro DeepSkyDad flat panel Bluetti Elite V2 battery system If you're new to astrophotography, this video will hopefully save you some frustration and show why great astro rigs are tuned, not simply bought. Clear skies, Martin 00:00 - Intro 01:32 - Purpose of the Rig 02:28 - Features of the Rig 05:45 - Resolving guiding issues 08:31 - Learning something new 10:03 - Focuser Issues 12:46 - Don’t buy everything all at once 13:54 - And now the results…. #astrophotography #Astronomy #DeepSkyAstrophotography #Telescope #Space #AstroImaging #PHD2 #Askar #ZWO #PrimaLuceLab