Ark Ark...mate you may laugh...
but here is somehting closer to home...
you all play with fancy pacny scopes, $2000 binos... and $5000 CDcams....
how about puting a little back like the train boys.
We spent four years back where I came from re-commissioning the old Historical 26inch ( yes thats Inchs!!!) Grubb Refractor ... It was the sister scope to the one last in the Great Astronomy Fire here.
We ahd to make new pieces for brass work stolen and sold for scrap and others just stealing peaces to say they "have a peace of it".
We battled to get guys to put in time and to work with a few ton's of steel and brass is hard work moving it around.
The final opening was for the big Mars event back in 2003. We got many visitors and many new young guns who where impressed by the scale of the project.
so how many histroical scopes and facilities are dead or going to dust??? and should guys like us save them???
here is a few images of the scope being used, a picture of the original pics taken back in the 1954 to 1956 by WS Finsen. This old girl can still produce great views with the big doublet 26 inch main lens!!! Only sad thing is she is now in the middle of a city and light pollution has stole her glory.
Tony
http://img13.imageshack.us/img13/757...iewings3lh.jpg
http://img62.imageshack.us/img62/343...s26inch9ko.jpg
http://img32.imageshack.us/img32/451...csboard3vk.jpg