Brent, why is that? Because of atmospheric limitations? Increased aperture = increased theoretical resolution. Large professional telescopes have very large secondary obstructions yet enjoy better resolution. We are great bunch of armchair quarterbacks, aren't we? It must be remembered that the telescope was built around a serendipitous mirror acquistion. Mike didn't have the option of "shopping" for any desired diameter. On Tue, Oct 29, 2013 at 2:30 PM, Brent Watson <brentjwatson@yahoo.com>wrote:
The resolution is indeed more like a 41 inch scope, but the light gathering power is equivalent to a 64 inch unobstructed apreture scope. This certainly will do better than the Grim by almost a magnitude.
Interestingly, if the secondary mirror were only 20 inches in diameter, the light gathering power would only increase by about 10%. I believe Chuck referred to this a day or so ago.