What mount is this?

Basically what Mike means is that you'll get rightly pissed off soon enough!

Frank - a C14 is not transportable on a regular basis.

If that is the OTA you want, you will need a serious mount - that is also unlikely to be transportable. You will need a permanent or semi permanent setup.

If you want transportability and a large aperture, the Dob is the only way to go. But that will not fulfil your astrophotography requirements.A transportable astrophotography setup would likely (at most) be a 6" refractor or an 8 to 10 inch reflector on a mount to suit. That would be the most you'd carry without becoming frustrated after a few trips.

As with anything in this game, its all a compromise...

Dave

A transported around a 12" for about 5 years and had enough of it, basically it came to either permanently mounting it or selling it. Thankfully a permanent solution was quickly decided upon.

Hi Frank.
Here is a bit of info on the CGE 14" scope



Recognized For Superior Stability:
An improved Super HD Tripod supports the CGE mount. This fully extendable tripod is made from the finest cold rolled carbon steel and can be raised to a height of 50". The tripod uses a dual leg support for maximum rigidity with an upper leg brace to provide an outward preload and a lower leg brace providing inward tension.

CGE Equatorial Mounts Can Easily be Balanced on Both Axes:
Balancing the weight of camera equipment and other visual accessories is accomplished by simply sliding the counterweight for Right Ascension and moving the optical tube along its dovetail mounting for Declination. This means that no additional weight needs to be added to balance the telescope when additional accessories are added.

Clearance For Accessories:
CGE mounts support their tubes at a single contact point allowing the tube to move freely around its polar axis without making contact with the telescope’s mount. This is particularly useful when adding photographic and CCD instruments that extend from the rear of the telescopes.

GPS Compatible:
All CGE mounts are compatible with Celestron’s CN16 GPS accessory (Item #93967). Combine the GPS and built-in Hibernate mode and these mounts will keep track and remember their exact location and time without the need to re-enter the information into the remote hand control.

General Details:

- Observatory-class computerized German equatorial mount
- Cold rolled carbon steel tripod legs provide extremely stable platform

Computerized :

- 40,000 object database with 400 user-definable objects and expanded information on over 200 objects
- Proven NexStar computer control technology
- GoTo system is precision accurate to 1.5 arcminutes
- Software Features include: Compass Calibration, Polar Alignment routine, Database Filter Limits, Hibernate, Auto North and Level, Quick Align, and user-defined slew limits
- Flash upgradeable hand control software and motor control units for downloading product updates over the Internet
- Custom database lists of all the most famous deep-sky objects by name and catalog number; the most beautiful double, triple and quadruple stars; variable star; solar systems; objects and asterisms
- Permanent programmable periodic error correction (PEC) - corrects for periodic tracking errors inherent to all worm drives
- Precision Bronze Worm Gear - 32 pitch, 5.625" pitch diameter, 180 tooth bronze gear manufactured in the U.S.A. by W. M. Berg, Inc. Manufactured to AGMA Quality Class 10 standard, which minimizes total composite error and backlash.
- Drive Motors - Made in the U.S.A., Pittman� LO-COGT brush-commutated DC motors offer smooth, quiet operation and long life. The motor armatures are skewed to minimize cogging which is required for low speed tracking.
- Bearing and Shaft - Stainless steel worm shaft has 0.4375 pitch diameter and is preloaded with two ball bearings. The worm is made from a single piece of steel (rather than a two-piece worm-and-shaft assembly) to minimize run-out, which is a source of PE
- 12VDC Servo Motors with integrated optical encoders with 0.11 arcsecond resolution
- No-slip clutch system for pointing precision
- Autoguide port, PC port and auxiliary ports located on the electronic pier for long exposure astrophotography
- Double line, 16-character Liquid Crystal Display Hand Control with backlit LED buttons for easy operation of goto features
- RS-232 communication port on hand control to control the telescope via a personal computer
- Includes NexRemote telescope control software, for advanced control of your telescope via computer
- GPS-compatible with optional CN16 GPS Accessory (93967)

And this is were i have the telescope at the moment and if you wan't to bring it off anywere you can no problem.

webtreatz.com/content/view/54/66/

(Here is me in England with my scope out of the observatory.)

Thanks lads,
Great advice.
I guess I should have made myself clearer,
when I mean dismantle for now, I'm thinking more along the
lines of having something I can take with me to a new house.
(I plan on moving in a year or two)
And not building a pier that I have to break down etc before I move...

Believe me, I have enough already of carting the bloomin' 5'' ETX up and down the
stairs along with all the gear not o mind a spine shattering chunk
of metal like the C14 & Mount!

I've been looking into b&q type sheds that could house the scope,
split wall designs and the like.
I don't want to go to the bother and expense of building an observatory that I am
going to leave behind but I don't want to not get a scope just because of that either.

I guess it just depends on your budget then (and SWMBO of course...)