ATM: Amateur Telescope MakingJan van Gastel's astronomy site |
| One
of the most rewarding aspects of astronomy
is ATM: Amateur
Telescope Making. Most self-built telescopes are Newtonian
telescopes on a Dobsonian mount. My first self-built telescope, a 12
inch f/6 Dobsonian
is pictured here. For transport
purposes, I rebuilt it into a truss telescope. I also built a 20
inch f/5 Dobsonian. A picture of both telescopes in Jou-sous-Monjou, Southern
France (summer 2004), is here.
In 2006/7 I rebuilt my 20 incher into a mucht lighter trilateral telescope (see menu at the bottom of this page). In 2009 I bought a new 20 inch f/3.6 mirror from Mike Lockwood (see menu below for a link to more information) and rebuilt my 20 incher for the second time. On the picture below I am preparing for an observing night (July 2009) with this telescope, at a very nice camping in Pouzols, in the French department Cantal, in Auvergne. We had plenty of room to place our telescopes close to our tent and there was no need to disassemble them before going to sleep. The night sky was very dark: SQM between 21.5 and 21.6.
For tracking, I built a
two-sector equatorial platform. You
will find an article with a very detailed description of how it's done
by clicking
here. There are two versions of the article: a Dutch and an English
version. After using an equatorial platform for a couple of years I
decided to computerize my 20 incher with Mel Bartel's stepper system.
The results for my old 20 incher can be seen here, for my trilateral
here.
Another activity I like is photographing the stars. Not through my telescope, but with a camera with standard lens or small telelens. To follow the stars, or better: to compensate for the movement of earth I built a 'scotch mount' or 'barndoor mount'. Detailed plans for two types of scotch mounts, moved manually or with a drivemotor are here. This article is only in the Dutch language, but I have links to articles in English. An important, recurring activity is collimating the (Newtonian) telescope. I have translated Nils Olof Carlin's excellent article on this topic into Dutch. There are links to the English and French versions as well. From here you can go to the version you prefer. Sometimes good binoculairs are better suited to view certain objects then a telescope. Especially for big and heavy binoculairs a good, steady and easy to use mount is very important. Therefore I built a lightweight aluminium binoculair mount. Sometimes I test telescopes. In 2009 I tested the Meade 16 inch LightBridge and wrote a review about it. The English version is here. The Dutch version can be downloaded from here
Well, before proceeding to my ATM projects it's maybe a good idea to have a look at a very ancient pre-John Dobson dobsonian. I think it's about f/2.5. It's not very lightweight, but it has a handle so it must be transportable. Saw it in a museum in Paris.
Go to: main menu
Go to: 20 inch telescope
Go to: my trilateral 20 inch dob
Go to: 20 inch f/3.6 Dobsonian Email to: jhm.vangastel(AT)ziggo.nl |
