Patrick, you are right. With one exception, I wouldn't have built it at all. As nice as it looks, wood is temporary in this application. An old hand on the atm-list once told me, "use wood for a telescope for yourself, but use more permanent materials if you want your creation to provide enjoyment for future generations." A lot of folks really like the looks of wood on a telescope, but unless one is doing a period piece, mostly for show, wood has too many limitations for a telescope that gets used outdoors frequently. Unless you use teak and a lot of spar varnish, that "cabinet-quality" wooden scope is going to be a warped, creaky mess in a relatively few years, without a LOT of rework. Plywood can help, but glued, dovetailed laminations seen edge-on don't impress me aesthetically. So after I got over my initial love affair with wood grain- walnut, zebra wood, lacewood, ebony- even apple-ply- etc., etc., I moved-on. That transformation was exactly the motivation behind my "Woodshop Telescope" series- a design that took advantage of simple woodworking tools and techniques, but using materials with more permanence. Coincidentally, I'm cleaning-out my closets this spring- and I've decided to sell the 4.25" f/5 Woodshop telescope- one of the one's I wrote about in S&T in March of '99, and pictured in the article. Should be on eBay in a few weeks if I don't accept an offer first. Be that as it may, those wooden scopes are still nice to look at, eh? --- Patrick Wiggins <paw@wirelessbeehive.com> wrote:
'Course if Chuck had built it the finder would match the OTA.
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