How is my saying that the stepper is a good solution trying to discredit your reputation? You don’t need me to discredit you; you have done that to yourself. You choose to challenge me and my opinions, but you had nothing to challenge me with, aside from incorrect misinformation and pigheadedness in sticking to your flawed logic. I don't appreciate a noob thinking he can tell me about the subject I spent nearly 3 decades practicing. From the start, you chose to dispute my post, not the other way around, so wipe your nose and keep your ears open and try to learn something. Really, you remind me of another cocky noob who thought he knew enough to tell senior, experienced people how wrong they were (ericgibbs remembers him well, I'm sure). When someone would tell him how little he knows, he would cry to the moderators and have the member warned/banned. I have to say I don't miss him at all.
It was you who came on here to tell the other members off, and say they were being "redundant" whatever the heck that's supposed to mean. Then, you told us of how we would all be beat senseless with our own ideas. You're arrogance stunk up the whole thread, so don't cry when an experienced member sets things straight. For now on, how about just write your opinions and leave the personal comments about the other members who are posting out of your posts????
You primitive circuit isn't really much simpler than a stepper, and doesn’t save many components. I count about 22 parts in the stepper controller, and about 18 parts in your orignial drawing, so you save a whole 4 small components. It may or may not be the better solution, depending on how the whole system is configured, but failure to understand how something works does not mean it's too complex, necessarily. Personally, I'd rather use the transistor switches than clunky relays. If properly done, the stepper doesn't need any timer, clock or other device to reset itself each morning. It can just sense the sun rise and slew back to the East as required. It's simple, performs well and does not stutter, or whatever you think it might do. There is a condition called "stall" but that wouldn't be a concern in a system such as this.