Explore Scientific FirstLight EXOS Nano EQ3 Mount; Steel ST1 Tripod, FL-EXOSNANOT1-00

Seems to be of good quality. Nice and solid. Knobs and locks seem adequate. Slo-mo controls very smooth. Tripod sturdy. Paint job is good. My ONLY issue is latitude adjustment is very tight. Good going up, not very smooth going down. I usually have to help it. Might just need to work in. Lube didn't seem to help. Hopefully it'll get better, if not, I can live with it. But, over-all, happy with my purchase .

When my husband took the mount out of the box we found it in two pieces. On a closer look there is no way it was damaged due to neglect in the shipping process since neither the shipping box, product box or the outside casing of the mount was damaged. It was either packaged broken in the first place or the metal was faulty and broke in transit. This was a thick molded metal and it rendered the mount unusable. Needless to say it was returned.

This mount is nicely made, light and works. I have been doing astronomy for several decades and one thing that never changes with astronomy gear is a lengthy lead time. Not as bad as criterion was before they went out of business in the 80s, but I ordered the mount around June 5th, and it arrived August 15th. Whew! The great news is it is perfect. As the photo shows it is for a scope I can throw in the RV and not be afraid of destroying. Lead times can be long, but for a light scope just backyard observing it will suit me fine.

Overall this has better build construction that I was expected. The design is simplified and mostly sturdy. When I added a 7.5lb weight (because the included weight can't balance my 15 lb scope), the mount wasn't as sturdy and had some wobble even with slight touches -- the wobble isn't terrible though, so it's more of an fyi. One other thing to consider is it's not that tall, so if you don't have a scope with an angled finder scope, good luck at finding stuff more than 45 degrees up.Although I was mostly surprised by how much I liked this mount, there is one major thing that bugs me... the control knobs fasten to the scope with screws that easily come loose all the time. This is a huge design flaw in an otherwise mostly excellent design for the price.At $129.99 I would definitely recommend this mount -- just be aware of the control knob screws!

Meets and exceeds expectatioins.

I was gifted a small Orion Starmax 90mm Mak-Cass telescope. The mount that came with the scope was not stable and was very hard to use. By the time the image stabilized, the object was almost out of view. I purchased the Explore Scientific FirstLight EXOS Nano EQ3 Mount, and it has greatly improved the quality of viewing as well as my enjoyment of the telescope. Once polar aligned, I can keep the object centered using only the one adjustment for right ascension. The mount is very stable with my light scope mounted and balanced. Highly recommend for lighter telescopes.

There is no way this weighs 1000 grams (2 pounds 3 ounces). The shipped weight is 17 pounds.

Pleasantly surprised at the quality construction sturdiness. "The best telescope is the one you will actually take outside", they say. In my case, I'm getting outside more with this light tripod and a smaller scope than I was with my larger, heavier scope and tripod.