Building my first astrophotography rig around a Williams Optics RedCat51 and the iOpteron Skyhunter with iPolar.

Great support from Astronz, answering my questions about assembly and set up. Some reviews of the Skyhunter point to problems with the RA clutch sticking, but I found the "use weight bar for leverage" solution worked fine.

Set up quick and easy; the instructions do assume a bit of technical knowledge but I'm finding CoPilot makes a great coach, even accepting screenshots if you are unclear.

iPolar took a little getting used to, but now down to a few minutes to get a very good alignment, after lining up on a compass baring. It does require a clear view of the Southern celestial pole, and I sometimes have to jockey the gain a bit if I'm setting up early evening and the light is changing.

Comparing to polar-alignment via platesolving in APT iPolar is faster, simpler, and easier, especially when setting the mount up in roughly the same place.

The mount plays very nicely with APT, so after using iPolar I'll platesolve, go to target, centre and sync. Very little drift even without a guide scope. (As an aside, CoPIlot makes a great coach, even able to interpret screen grabs and offer practical advice)

Not requiring power is another plus, keeping the cabling a bit easier. Powering/connecting the iOpteron, mount and a ZWO EAF all through a single USB-C hub from the laptop works fine.

Once I'd got past total newbie learning (with CoPilot) my first attempt landed my ~180 x 30 second exposures of Eta Carinae and exactly the kind of image I wanted to get.

Added an extra weight later on to balance the scope - CoPilot again very helpful on torque calculations and carrying capacity if you are a newbie like me.

Total rig weight is about 3.2KG excluding counterweights which works fine.

Very happy!