Did you ever get that sinking feeling when you pull up to a job and see what the last guy did? Because man, I feel for you here. Topping is one of those things where the customer thinks they're saving money and you end up babysitting a tree for years, and the sad part is the maple pays the price for it, not him. I've had the same talk with folks who swear by the buzz cut and the thing that works best for me is just showing them pictures of a topped tree a couple years out, because words don't land but seeing that broom look usually does. It's a bummer you had to find out the hard way, but at least his other maple proves your point for you.

Watched a buddy do almost the same thing last winter with the Andromeda galaxy, 600 frames at 1.6 seconds on a plain tripod, and his stack came out really clean. He did have to throw away maybe 80 of them because a car drove by and washed out the frame, which is the one thing a tracker saves you from. On the flip side my other friend runs a tracker and gets the same result in like 20 minutes instead of 2 hours, so it's mostly about how much time you want to spend babysitting the shutter. For wide field stuff though, short stacks work great and your uncle gave you solid advice.