Quote:
Originally Posted by ZeroID
Rolf, a couple of questions.
Did you come up with a weight for the scope ? Asking because long term I intend to probably 'copy' your design for my own setup using again my existing 10" mirrors and spider.
Is it also still holding collimation well ? If it proves robust enough I'd possibly be modifying to also sit in a DOB base. A pair of ( removable?) quadrants on either side of the central cage might allow an easy transition. I don't have a Ob ( yet ) and this plan is over the next two years maybe.
And second: Do you sheild the primary from stray light. I thought of using a lightweight ( black card maybe ) tube inside the truss above the mirror cell. Or does the Ob installation make that unnecessary ?
Still the nicest ATM scope I have seen.
Cheers
Brent
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Thanks for your kind words Brent
I haven't weighed it yet, because I didn't want to take it down and have to maybe re-collimate etc. But I'll have to do it soon because there are a few things I want to correct.
They are only minor issues such as when I want to remove the cover I made for the main mirror then it tends to get slightly stuck on the bolts that hold the bottom truss tubes, so I'll file them down a bit. I also want to experiment with installing some fans for cooling both the primary and secondary. So once I do that I'll be able to also weigh it, but I can tell you it's pretty light, less than a sonotube of similar aperture which I was surprised about.
Collimation was still spot on last time I used it which is maybe a week ago, so that's promising.
And you could certainly modify the design to fit on a DOB base, there is a very nice example of that here:
http://www.cloudynights.com/item.php?item_id=2571
Regarding stray light, I have noticed it several times on image frames depending on the direction of the scope, so it's something to watch out for. I am however able to switch off all light and computer screens in the observatory while imaging and then it's completely dark here, so I have gotten around the issue so far. But when I take it down to install the fans then I think I will also look into fitting some screens in appropriate locations.
I'll post an update here once I get around to fix these small issues