from what i see in the photos of the meads they use the same mount for the 6,8 and 10 inch they just have larger counter weights.
i've done some piggy back, (turned out pretty good, not great but can at least got an idea of whats possible. i tried eyepiece projection (jupiter) and have not been thrilled with the results mostly because of my own rushing the shots and not waiting for the heat turbluence in the scope to calm and from a not so good night. the couple prime focus i've tried were rather dismal from poor guiding on my part. (gotta talk to the guy running the scope ;)
>As for photography vs. CCDs, my preference is a wide field color photo over a
>CCD image pretty much any day of the week (I know, I'm just weird). Fuji and
>Kodak are doing wonders with new emulsions these days, try Kodak Ultra Gold
>400. Besides, if you already have an SLR camera the startup costs are much
>lower too, depending on what you can cobble together for a guiding
>arrangement. Cheap department store refractors can make for a passable guide
>scope if you already have one gathering dust in a corner.
i agree on the photo vs ccd
>It sounds like you're just interested in short duration astrophotos (ie - less
>than 15 minutes), so the requirements are a bit less stringent than for
>marathon sessions at the guiding eyepiece. For these length exposures you
>don't really need declination corrections if your polar alignment is good.
>Besides, a simple tangent arm for dec corrections isn't that big of a deal to
>hook up.
15 minutes or so would suit me fine.
>If you want info about my homebuilt equatorial feel free to ask...
send it along, email to me or if any one else is interested....
thanks jm