Indeed a great man has gone. Brought the larger apertures affordable. Thanks to him many people can use a 20, 30 or 40cm or even larger aperture for an affordable price in the backyard.
And the first Dobsons ever build did exist long before John Dobson was even born: the 1.20m telescope of William Herschel and the 1.80m telescope of Lord Rosse. They were of virtually the same design.
RIP John Dobson ..... If you ever saw the documentary on his life as I did his words "Come look at the Moon" echo in my mind. He was also a dedicated sidewalk astronomer, showing countless 1000's of people their 1st view of the night sky. A huge contribution to amateur astronomy & a life well lived !
John Dobson Guest Speaker at Parkes CWAS Meeting 2005
Hello We were Blessed in 2005 John Dobson Gave a Talk at our Parkes CWAS Meeting - Plus we had a Viewing Night with John.It was at The CSIRO Dish at Parkes.John Signed a couple of my Books - He also Signed My 10 inch Dobsonian - Reguard's Tony- For me It was a Dream Come true.
Last edited by anthony.tony; 17-01-2014 at 10:35 AM.
Reason: Spelling.
I think I will buy a copy......I seem to remember it was a very inspiring doco.
It has stayed with me ever since I was a lad and first saw it, even when I was not into astronomy I would always recall this doco and the urge to build a dob.
In fact it was probably conversation with my wife about just this that prompted her to get me a scope for my birthday and I haven't looked back since.
Indeed a great man has gone. Brought the larger apertures affordable. Thanks to him many people can use a 20, 30 or 40cm or even larger aperture for an affordable price in the backyard.
And the first Dobsons ever build did exist long before John Dobson was even born: the 1.20m telescope of William Herschel and the 1.80m telescope of Lord Rosse. They were of virtually the same design.
I believe that the Dobsonian part of the system is simply the use of a Teflon (then nylon) on Formica bearing. It sounds trivial, but it absolutely changed the way that large amateur alt-az telescopes were made and they deservedly now all bear his name.
My JD story: I showed him live video of the Aussie night sky via the internet back in 2007 as part of a multinational webcast!
I believe that the Dobsonian part of the system is simply the use of a Teflon (then nylon) on Formica bearing. It sounds trivial, but it absolutely changed the way that large amateur alt-az telescopes were made and they deservedly now all bear his name.
Also the use of thin ship porthole glass for mirror blanks was a huge innovation . Many of the scopes made in their classes were at least 12" or larger . Using anything but thick Pyrex was unheard of in those days. With the use of a simple plywood 9 and 18 point cells much larger mirrors came in 1" glass.
Apparently many many tons of surplus glass from the San Francisco ship yards was turned into telescopes. Many of these instruments turned up to star parties to fuel the aperture boom. This blew away the notion that `serious ' telescopes had to be made from thick expensive glass.
I wonder if that special they did on his sidewalk astronomy is stored somewhere on the net......might have a look around.
The Sidewalk Astronomer movie has just been put on youtube.
Watch it asap as I don't know how long it'll stay there- last time someone put it up, it got removed.
It sure brings a tear & a smile to one's eye when the opening scene has John Dobson saying "come look at the moon, come look at the moon".
RIP John Dobson. I watched the interview with him and was much impressed by his "down to earth" approach to astronomy and his wish to share it to the wider population. BTW, I do have a copy of the interview on the HDD on this computer, will share it with anyone who wants it, big file though, so probably best to burn to a disc and post it.
