Ad Astra Observatory

It’s been a long time since I’ve had the telescope out. I’ve considered selling all the gear and picking up some other hobby.

Between spotty access to clear skies, a new latitude that requires a modification to the north foot of the mount, and general apathy, it’s been hard to convince myself to go out.

My friend, the Mount Whisperer, recently borrowed the NJP, put it on his workbench, tightened about 3 bolts, and declared it ready to roll.

He also provided me with a very nice piece of 3/4″ acrylic, to use as the basis for a step for the north foot of the mount.

I think that, more than anything else, it was the acrylic that pushed me to do something. It’s just a really pretty piece of gear.

So, I poked around in the shop, found enough scrap ply to make a piece about 2-1/4″ thick, cut it to fit the acrylic, and glued it all together. I’ll bolt on the plastic, and the resulting block should both lift the front leg of the mount high enough that I can easily get a polar alignment, and be very thermally stable.

I am a little worried that I made the thing too tall. Will the mount still be stable with its front end lifted that high, and Veronica and a bunch of counterweight being thrown around? I’m not sure. I hope so.

If I put it all together and it looks like it’s going to fall over, I’ll go make another block of ply that’s a little thinner.

It’s been clear for the past several nights; we’re in the post-solstice clear time, just like last year. It’s been in the 20s at night, but it’s clear as a bell, and Orion and Jupiter are up there, just mocking me.

Here’s hoping that my next post will come sooner than the last one did.