Paramount-ME
The Paramount ME's control system uses brush-less DC Servo motors. If the mount is used for survey astronomy all night, every clear night, no other type of motor is sufficient. Note that the life of the brush-less DC servo motor is limited to the service life of the bearings. This translates to about 100,000 hours under normal operating conditions. On the other hand, the life of brushed DC Servo motors is limited to the life of the carbon brushes, which is anywhere from 4,000-10,000 hours according to the manufacturer’s specifications. Brush-less motor also do not "cog" at any rate. This ensures a smooth, constant output when tracking at the Sidereal rate.
Paramount MKS-3000 Specifications:
- Brush-less DC-servo motors ensure long life and smooth operation.
- Fast slew speeds and consistent torque at all slew rates. A maximum rate of five degrees per second in right ascension and seven degrees per second in declination gets you to the object.
- Virtually unlimited selection of tracking and slew rates.
- User-defined parameters can be stored to on-board flash RAM.
- Numerous safety features critical to remote operation including current-limit protection, encoder-error limits, acceleration ramping, and user-definable maximum slew speeds.
- Programmable and updateable Periodic Error Correction.
- Intelligent German Equatorial flipping eliminates unnecessary long slews.
- The MKS-3000 control system can track at true lunar, solar, minor planet or comet, NEO or LEO satellite rates, or at almost any user-defined rate.
Performance Specifications:
- Periodic Error (Tracking) - The right ascension gear has 5 arcseconds periodic error or less, before periodic error correction and without ProTrack.
- Backlash - The spring-loaded worm-to-gear interface has virtually zero backlash in both the right ascension and declination axis.
- Pointing - Less than one arcminute RMS all-sky pointing. (Typical results vary from 10 to less than 60 arcseconds all-sky pointing. Results may vary depending upon the optical system, pier and other variables).
