Ad Astra Observatory

Veronica has never quite recovered from the Frankenstein act I pulled on her when I was trying to get the RCC working, and she has one remaining thorn in her side, a huge 2.6″ secondary which I am having a lot of trouble getting lined up properly with the primary and the spider… it’s a nightmare.

I spent a couple evenings trying to get Veronica in collimation, and have decided that the only real solution is to upgrade to an Astrosystems spider and secondary holder, which will hold that big mirror right in the center of the tube.

I spent the past couple of days trying to figure out how to make an Astrosystems spider work, as the distance between the center of the focuser and the front of the tube is very short, only 4.25″. I talked it over with Randy Cunningham at Astrosystems, and he’s going to build me a custom spider with a very short 3/4″ center hub, which should allow me to use the OEM spider mount holes! Awesome. I put in my order today, and hopefully Veronica will be good as new in a couple weeks when the spider arrives.