Telescope Reviews: Useing meade tripods for other DIY projects.

I am thinking about buying a Meade DS-2080AT GoTo Telescope. For a cheap pan head to do time lape photography. When doing research on the DS-2000 series. I have noticed that some of the mounting arm assemblies. Are at a slightly different angle from one another. I do not know if this is because of the promotional photos or that they really are different from each other. Seems strange that the same family or series would have many differences. However thats how it looks. If someone has two telescopes from the DS-2000 series. Can you check them out for me and tell me if the mounting arm assemblies are different from one another, or is it the angle of the promotional pictures on vendor websites. Also can anyone give me an idea on the weight capacity of the mounting arm assemblies. I am going to have to mount the camera with a counter weight and would not want to crack/stess the assembly. Any other suggesions would be helpful as well for a slow pan head. However I have not been able to find any within my 200 dollar budget.