I purchased an early-2000's Celestron NexStar 8 SCT and noticed that the tripod was a bit wobbly. This was due to the tiny screw in the tripod legs stripping out the plastic they were threaded in to.
To improve the overall stiffness of the tripod, these spacers are placed between the leg sections and long (<6.5mm diameter, ~80mm length) screws are threaded completely through. You will need to enlarge the existing holes in the plastic parts on the tops of the legs and drill holes completely through the aluminum legs.
This greatly improved the performance of the tripod, and I was confident placing over 50 pounds of equipment (mount head, counterweight, OTA, etc.) above it.
| NexStar_Tripod_Spacers_Stiffness_Upgrade.f3d | 179.0KB | |
| NexStar_Tripod_Spacers_Stiffness_Upgrade.stl | 663.6KB |
