How do you find the time? congratulations on your project I can hardly wait
to see the details. I bought an old ten in. Coulter a while back and have
been enjoying it for what it is. A true original. And all the while
dreaming about what I might do to bring a reasonably good mirror into the
modern age. I hope to see your effort soon and thank you for the nice read.
A ten inch F-5 makes a nice physical length scope. Bob
Jay Reynolds Freeman wrote:
> Some of you are familiar with my current telescope-building project,
> a 10-inch f/5 truss-tube Dobson that will take down compactly enough to
> meet checked baggage limits on the airlines. I had some bits and pieces
> of it at the last SJAA general meeting.
>
> The telescope is not yet finished, but tonight was first light, in
> the restricted sense that I had the mechanical parts all together, with
> the optics in place, focusing on a few random stars. With no light
> baffle, no paint (so that stray light was bouncing off bare wood
> surfaces), and Palo Alto suburban lighting, I wasn't going to do any
> serious work, and with no finder installed yet, I was unlikely to locate
> anything to look at, anyway. The purpose of setting up was to verify
> that there were no surprises lurking in errors of measurement or in
> errors of calculation.
>
> Well, I am still waiting for the other shoe to drop, but everything
> fit, the focal point was where I expected it to be, and the balance was
> a little bit tail heavy -- I planned conservatively, to err on that
> side, and will use finder weight and position to tweak it, after I have
> the shroud in place, too.
>
> I am of course very pleased, and I wanted to go public in a forum
> where the weather gods might be listening, and say loudly that I DO NOT
> PLAN ANY REAL OBSERVATIONS FOR ANOTHER MONTH OR SO, so don't go blaming
> me when it rains at the Messier marathon this weekend...
>
> This isn't the largest telescope I have built, but it is certainly
> the most complicated. There has been a lot of rather fussy wood
> working, with relatively close tolerances. Yet the unit indeed shows
> signs of turning out suitable for its intended purpose. I expect I will
> do some lengthy postings on it after it is further along.
>
> -- Jay Freeman
>
> PS: I'm not going to tell you what color I am going to paint it, you
> will have to wait and see...