A home-made 150mm Newtonian telescope on an altazimuthal mount
This is a great time of year for astronomy, stargazing and such because of the still winter air and long nights, not that I have been actively partaking of late. I do have a Newtonian ten inch (245mm) equatorially mounted reflecting telescope which is under cover inside the house! The problem is that the only possible place to use it is in the rear garden which faces more or less north north-east with a huge house, ours, blocking the southern sky. The only place it could be used is on the patio where at some point objects in the southern sky come into view as the Earth rotates. That means waiting most of the night for some of them to come into view. There is no proper view to the eastern or western horizons either. The front of the house is well-lit up by street lighting with one lamp-post directly in front of the house! The only real option is to site the telescope on the roof and that is what I had begun to construct some years ago but it needed a dome of some kind constructing. In fact if I could afford a proper dome it would set me back probably around £5000 or more just to buy it. I do have that sort of cash but am loathed to spend it on a dome as I am sure one could be constructed for much less. It is only a thought at the moment. The platform and access to the roof I completed years ago as I say. If I were to go ahead with such plans I would have access to all points of the compass and would also be above the glow of the street lighting too. It wouldn’t be perfect but it would be far better than using the garden with the telescope over forty-five feet higher with an almost unhindered access to the sky. I would need to draw up plans and have a decent joiner/carpenter construct it if I decide to go ahead. We’ll have to see.
Shirley Anne
Related articles
- Why Britons are looking to the skies as astronomy becomes our national hobby (guardian.co.uk)
- Newtonian telescope (en.wikipedia.org)
