Ad Astra Observatory

My astro-Jedi friend Art came over to kick Trixie’s tires a little. He brought a laser, did a rough collimation, and then hung some weight off the focuser (in the form of the DSLR, to demonstrate a “real load” on the UTA). The laser spot did move a bit when he added the weight. Then he slewed the scope to various positions in the sky. The laser spot moved very, very little, perhaps subtending a circle 1/4″ in diameter or so.

Art says this is enough slop that I’ll need to put together a good MaxPoint pointing model, but he was pretty impressed with how solid the scope is.