Category Archives: Astronomy

Building an observatory. Construction #4

Posted on June 14, 2018 by james

Not a lot of progress on Saturday. I mainly got the shuttering set up for the centre pads for the long sides, but whilst I had the digger there I also excavated the holes for the three pier foundations: On … Continue reading →

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Building an observatory. Construction #3

Posted on June 5, 2018 by james

What finer way could a blazing hot sunny day be spent than barrowing and shovelling a tonne of concrete? ???? This Sunday I started the day by cutting some of the outer floor timbers to length and digging the previously-mentioned … Continue reading →

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Building an observatory. Construction #2

Posted on June 5, 2018 by james

Having decided that I can wrap the timber in DPC material to protect it from damp, this Saturday afternoon I lowered the shuttering for the two concrete blocks that I’d already put in place so that the highest one will … Continue reading →

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Building an observatory. Design #2

Posted on June 5, 2018 by james

Though I’m not 100% confident in my welding skills, I’m coming round to the idea of making the frame for the rolling roof section from a square section steel tube. I think in the end it will be lighter, less … Continue reading →

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Building an observatory. Work commences.

Posted on June 5, 2018 by james

Once I’d mowed the grass in the planned area I wasn’t entirely happy about the steepness of the slope. The floor deck will be built off six concrete pads and the pad at the bottom of the slope would have … Continue reading →

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Building an observatory. The design.

Posted on June 5, 2018 by james

I’ve been tinkering with Sketchup (version 8 — the latest one I can get to work under Wine) to create a design for the observatory. It’s quite a handy tool for setting things out to see how they’ll all work … Continue reading →

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Building an observatory. Part 1 of many :)

Posted on June 5, 2018 by james

I’ve been promising myself that I’d build an observatory for years, but life has just got in the way a bit and I never managed to get started. I’ve now decided that I should really get on with it, so … Continue reading →

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Star Adventurer Polar Scope Alignment

Posted on May 9, 2018 by james

Having checked the tracking accuracy of my Star Adventurer already, I wanted to make sure the polar scope was correctly aligned before trusting it to location the pole using Polaris. There are a couple of things to worry about for … Continue reading →

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Star Adventurer Tracking Accuracy Results

Posted on April 27, 2018 by james

After running for 24 hours I stopped the SA running and measured the distance from the finishing point to my initial mark: Looks like it’s gone a bit too far. However, that’s in a solar day, not a sidereal day, … Continue reading →

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Checking Star Adventurer tracking accuracy

Posted on April 25, 2018 by james

I wanted to get this done now so I can get any problems sorted before actually wanting to use the mount in anger, so I’ve set the entire mount up with the counterweight bar almost touching a wall. I marked … Continue reading →

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