FINAL ASSEMBLY

•    The final assembly goes quite quickly. The first job was to cut the hole for the focuser. I had bought that previously from Beacon Hill Telescopes so the task was limited to measuring the position on the tube, cutting the hole with  a hole cutter (what else?), carefully positioning the focuser over the hole, drilling and bolting the thing to the tube. An advantage of this type of tube design - you don't have to worry about getting it square to the tube - alignment is semi-automatic.

•    The approximate position of the spider was then worked out (it is adjustable) , the four holes drilled with a piece of paper inside the tube to catch any sawdust, and another two holes drilled as a universal finderscope mount. The spider and diagonal mirror were then bolted in.

•     The mounting holes for the mirror cell had previously been drilled in the tube, so the assembly was slid in and the screws inserted. The raw end of the tube was covered and protected with a length of PVC edging of 'hockeystick' profile. This had to be carefully cut and trimmed to fit round the octagon of the tube.

In all its glory on the Dob. stand

•    The last job was to get the router out again and make a push-fit cover for the open end end of the telescope.

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