Hi all
After building several small observatories, I thought it time to invest in a proper dome observatory. Something I can settle back and enjoy in my future retirement.
So where have I been in regard to DIY observatories. First endeavour was a garden shed converted to a roll of roof for a 10" Newtonian on a Samson EQ mount in Wagga. Failed to use this due to joining the Army. Second endeavour was as Roll off box design for a Meade 10" LX200 Classic. It worked well for about 12 months but then we sold up and move house.
Third endeavour was again a garden shed converted to a roll of roof. This housed two telescopes, an ED120 and a Meade 14" LX200. Failed to use this after a period of time due to working in the telescope sales business. Didn't feel like doing astronomy after talking about it all day with customers. Forth endeavour was converting the above roll off observatory into a structure that would rotate. Something similar to a ScopeDome. This housed a Skywatcher 16" Goto Dob, nice telescope but crap observatory.
Final endeavour was back to the Roll off box design, which like the Mill Park version works a treat. Currently house a Meade 12" LX200GPS. During this build I reinstate the pier on the original pier foundations I created when I did the Roll off Roof observatory. It is a substantial piece of concrete, coming in at about one cubic meter. I cleaned and level the top, put in Rebar and used a 10” Storm water pipe as a former and filled it with concrete, very solid.
I have added some photos for a bit of a visual journey of my past endeavours.
Where to now, well after some research and quite a bit of Googling I have settled on Observatory Dome by Charles Baetsen (
https://va3ngc.weebly.com/obs---dome-1.html) which includes a plan in PDF format. Currently I am in the process of drafting a scaled up the design. I am working on an outside radius of 2.61m and an inside radius of 2.43m for the dome. This will sit on a square support structure with surface area of 6.8m2 . Overall structure height not to exceed 3m, so as to stay inside council building guidelines so as a building permit will not be required. I still have the paperwork ready in case I need a permit.
Also have fleshed out ideas for the roller, shutter and even a drive system to move the dome. Anyway, tomorrow I will be starting to route out the ring and frame for the dome.
Stay tuned and see you at the next post.
