I purchased the EQ8-R mount in December 2023 and now have been using it for almost 3 months. In summary, I am cautiously happy with the mount.

Pros
• Sales support was great from All-Star telescope. Scope was delivered on schedule to my observatory.
• Mount easily handles my 70 lbs of telescope and imaging equipment (includes 88 lbs of counterweights). Slews fast, works well with plate solving in NINA.
• Seems to work well to temperatures down to -10C. Haven’t tested below this.
• I would consider the periodic error of the RA gear to be excellent. Tested 6 worm cycles with PemPro to measure RA tracking accuracy to 0.76 seconds RMS (without PEC). Wow!
• Autoguiding keeps overall error down to around 0.6 RMS Arcseconds and is basically seeing-limited. I can now image with my C14” Schmidt reliably. Excellent.
• Polar alignment was very smooth and easily done using NINA 3-star routine.
• Integration with Green Swamp Server is good and works with my system well. Took some time to learn and get working right.
• Auto home to reset calibration feature is welcome and necessary since clutches are weak and sometimes slip.
• Good price point for a mount with these capabilities.

Cons
• Dec backlash is excessive for a mount in this range. Tested 2000 ms in PHD2. I consider this unacceptable, and Skywatcher should either make periodic adjustment of backlash easy to do by the user (without worrying about voiding warranty) or make the worm spring-loaded as many other mounts do. Of course, a poorly implemented, spring-loaded worm gear would be worst. This poor backlash was compensated for by the ease of polar alignment. I have achieved near perfect polar alignment and Dec corrections are rarely needed during tracking. Auto guiding is working well at this point so I will live with the Dec backlash.
• No real-time clock in Synscan. Really, I guess I am just used to Celestron mounts.
• Don’t like that hand controller attaches to the movable part of the mount. It would be nicer if USB, power and hand control were connected to the stationary part of the mount. However, with my set up I control from a computer through Green Swamp Server and have disconnected the hand control, don’t use it and put it away in a box.
• Axis clutches are weak but functional.
• Seals on both axis between the elements and gears are not the best considering the observatory environment. Gears seem exposed to elements.
• Mount needs a solid power supply. My mount had moments where it refused to turn on. This is worrisome, but cycling the power switch a few times brought it back.
• Older versions of the EQ8 came in a nice road case. This one comes in a cardboard box. Not an issue for my permanent installation, but the box is big and difficult to store in-case warranty work is needed.

Calling this mount “observatory class” is a bit of a stretch, but it is observatory class in that it is really too heavy to be used in anything but a permanent mount situation. If the mount continues to work as it is now, I will be really happy with it. However, at $7000 this is a serious investment for me that I can’t repeat, so if long-term reliability becomes an issue (as some other users experience), I will be very disappointed. Thus, cautious optimism.

Out of the box the unit shipped suffered several tracking issues. The unit would periodically bind and PHD2 reported variable significant DEC backlash 6-9 seconds. The unit was also making a grinding sound and slewed erratically. Tracking was also very erratic.

Unit was shipped to sky-watcher for warranty repairs. Unit has been returned and after the first couple of nights, the DEC backlash is now around 2 seconds and tracking seems to be stable. According to skywatcher tech support the worm gear drive needed to be adjusted.

PROS
Carries a heavy payload
Exterior build quality has nice finish
Saddle is well thought out and sturdy. Appreciate the large ****.
Power pass through and USB hub is well thought out.

CONS
Heavy and bulky
Internal parts and build quality should be reconsidered (especially given the target consumer and price point)
Variable backlash
Lack of transparency from sky-watcher (see below)

Comments about All-star telescope sales and after purchase support
Nick at Allstar telescope was easy to work with and was helpful, during and after purchase. I have purchased several items from this supplier and may buy again from them

Comments about Sky-watcher products and tech-support
I would say that I was a loyal sky-watcher customer. I started with a small star adventurer, had two EQ6r PROs and an own an Esprit 120. All of these items are great to own. And worked flawlessly out of the box. I still own one EQ6r pro and enjoy using it every clear night with my mid-sized gear. When I needed help with purchasing a replacement part or had some issues with these products, sky watcher tech support was great to work with.

However, I found working with them on the EQ8r PRO was not a great experience and it impacted my brand loyalty quite significantly. The tech support often would respond with one line comments instead of answering questions posed.

When I first reported issues with the mount, the tech support asked me to produce some unguided data through PHD2. Which I did. They claimed the mount was working within tolerances despite the numerous PHD2 data reports I provided them to the contrary and repeated statements of what I was hearing and seeing in the real world environment while trying to resolve the issues over several nights. It was only after I provided a video on a particular bad performance night did they agree to service the mount.

When the mount was received by skywatcher, they twice asked if I had opened the mount even stating there were residual finger prints in the interior. I had not opened the mount. When I asked if they had cleaned the “fingerprints”, they refused to answer. After which, the mount was repaired in less than a day and shipped back to me.

Lack of transparency around this “observatory class” mount is problematic. There does not seem to be any sky-watcher published information around performance. Information around expected backlash, tracking performance and operating temperatures would be welcome. This should be standard and would help the customer determine if the mount is working to spec. But instead, we must really on tech support to assess the mount remotely with logs. I have repeatedly asked for this information and they have refused to provide. I get why they might not want to report expected tracking performance as there are so many variables beyond the mount’s control. But expected backlash performance and operating temp range should be provided.

Overall comments
Do you research before buying this mount given its price point. I accept that it is possible I had bad luck with the mount that was shipped to me. Honestly, I relied on my past experience with skywatcher products and some YouTube videos. But one should dig deeper before buying, look on cloudy nights, look at some of the other forums, and join the EQ8r pro Facebook page. At least then you will have some information about the quirks related to this mount and you can make an informed purchase decision.

Clear skies.