who would contribute to a $5000000 time share robotic observatory

[Baron von Richthofen]

:astron::reindeer:Just a thought, who would contribute to a $5000000 time share robotic observatory and how much
We are talking a serious observatory controlled from your computer at home
I wonder what you get for that sort of money, I am sure it would be eligible for a government grant of some sort

[space oddity]

Guessing maintenance would be in the order of 50 K per year, to say nothing of the capital outlay/capital servicing would work out at a hefty amount per night of use. Absolute minimum of $200 per night. Realistically, taking in to account all costs/ bad conditions etc would be in the order of 3-5 k per night.Guesstimate $500 per hour. Also, the scope would be likely to crash if used by someone at home who keyed in the wrong stuff. There is such a robotic scope up at Siding Springs that was donated be some billionaire(I think Paul Allen of Microsoft) that was to be used online by school kids. It crashed, so is still sitting there with its computer kaput:(.Methinks this is in the realm of academic institutions, not well heeled amateurs.

[Ric]

I think I'll stick with my own scope, I can go and have a look any time I want to.

Cheers

[tlgerdes]

Martin Pugh is looking for partners/benefactors and I dont think it will be in that sort of money region.

http://www.iceinspace.com.au/forum/showthread.php?t=54575

[rally]

The maths doesnt add up.

Lets say you spend more than any average australian amateur is ever likely to be able to afford on such a venture - lets say $100,000 - to get your shareholding up as high as possible.

That means you would be a 1/50th shareholder - entitled to 1/50th of the good nights or time slots thereof.
If there were 300 good nights (big if) that means you get 6 of them for your $100k.
But of course an observatory of this size needs full time staff and has substantial overheads and maintenance costs plus the gear would need to be replaced after 10 years anyway.

So an $100k initial investment will also necessitate an annual contribution of maybe $50k per ($100k) shareholder (at least) not including replacement and upgrade costs.

Thats pretty expensive amateur astronomy ! - over 10 years its likely to cost someone at least $600k (at least) for 6 nights a year over 10 years.

You could buy an awful lot of appreciating real estate assets complete with a private observatory and high quality gear for that and get to use it all quite selfishly for maybe 100 nights of the year.

Why would any government provide a grant for a bunch of wealthy amateurs who are in the business of wasting large sums of their own money.

So its a silly question - that's my thought.

PS - Of course you could put in $10,000 and be entitled to an hour a year - you'd sure want to hope it wasnt cloudy on your allocated time slot !

[Baron von Richthofen]

The federal government would give about $2mil towards the project and $150k per year for up keep so it would work out a bit better and it would be able to do solar observing as well as night

[space oddity]

The more you look at the maths, the less it adds up as being viable. The real maintenance would be closer to $500,000 per year which is 10k for those 6 nights which is in itself rather optimistic. The total for that 1/50th share winds up being $200,000 for just 36 nights or 44,444 per night assuming a 10 year life of the system.Could be worse, if 1/3 of the nights are lost, it would be 66,666.66 per night -a rather devilish number indeed:rofl:.
Relying on governments is prone to disappointment, as they are more than likely to pull the plug.
Leave it to the universities

[JethroB76]

They would? Wonder what will they give me for my 20" dob project