Thanks to Leslie Brown, our little club is in possession of major professional-grade optics. Thank you Leslie! The Conn College 20" Ritchey-Chretien mirror set is safely ensconced in my workshop. Rather than simply storing them, I hope that we can mount and use them.?
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I suggest that we try putting them in a semi-portable dob style mounting that a club without a permanent observatory could use. As an example, here is a similar project done years ago by Mike Lockwood: loptics.com/ATM/telescopes/12in_cass/12in_cass.html
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Although I am very tempted to offer to build a beast like this, I have to admit to myself that it would be at least two years before I could get to it. So I've taken the liberty of asking Ryan Goodsen at New Moon Telescopes and Normand Fullum at Optiques Fullum if they would be intersted in the project. I haven't committed the club to anything, just seeing if the build would be possible.
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Or, if we don't want a professional is anyone else in the club interested in doing something similar? It's always more fun to use a telescope built by a friend!
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Some details to think about: price, components (mirror cell, spiders x2, tertiary flat diagonal, focuser, field rotator, go-to & tracking system, dew busting, a ray trace to determine spacing, where to put the focuser (on top like Lockwood or out the the side through an altitude bearing), and more.
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Whatcha think? Jay
Jay Drew