[pmrid (Peter)]

I have recently acuquired an old "orange" C14 that has been de-forked and is due to be mounted on a Titan (when it finally arrives). The process of deforking exposed the holes arounf the rim of the base of the OTA where the fork was previously attached. There are 4 of them and there a few other smaller holes where various weight bars were attached). I am thinking about a way of using these holes (suitably masked for filtering effect) to assist in creating an airflow through the tube to aid in cooling the mirror down to ambient. The idea I have been toying with is to mount a reasonably-sized computer case-type fan on a 2" adapter and fitted into the focuser tube at the back so that it sucks air out of the tube and therefore through those exposed holes.

The air flow through those holes would be across the base of the mirror and then up into the OTA and down the baffle tube. To increase the cooling effect I was also thinking about attaching 3 peltiers to the outside of the base of the OTA with a heat sink and fan on top in the hope that this would cool the baseplate of the scope across which air is being drawn from those exposed holes and therfore adding to the cooling effect.

I am trying to avoid having to do unduly ugly things to the OTA like removing the primary and suchlike. That's why I am hoping to make use of what is already there. Since I haven't used Peltiers before I am unsure whether they would do much good if, for example, I attach the cold side directly to the outside of the baseplate (with some thermal grease of course). Anyone have any ideas on all this?

Peter.