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Hoop pine ply, hardwood ply or marine grade ply. Any one of these is a good option.
Don't use pine ply as it is too soft and it will flex too much.
If you are going to the trouble of building a new dob mount, it is a good idea then to improve upon what Saxon, Skywatcher and GSO punch out. Their mounts are plagued with issues. Leaving crappy particle board aside, the biggest problem their mounts have is the alt bearing is set too low towards the primary mirror, and the alt bearing is too small. Result is needing some type of friction mechanism in order to control the "balance" in altitude. This is not a balanced situation, is it now!
Redesign the entire mount, and you will end up with a dob that does not require some dicky friction mechanism for the alt bearing, a quality of action that is constant and unchanging, and it won't matter if you swap between a wee 6mm plossl or a 1kg lump of an eyepiece the scope will stay put. This will also eliminate backlash, or flex, in mount as there is no excessive force that needs to be exerted before the friction mechanism yields to allow the scope to move.
Just copy the original mount that came with the scope and you just reproduce the same mechanical problems that all these mass production dobs have instead of eliminating them. Redesign the mount from the start, and you end up with a scope that will be a sheer delight to use, not wrestle with.
Alex.
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