Pier Construction

Initially, I considered the ideal of a dome to be too complicated and costly for my limited skills and resources. Consequently, the design started life as a run-off roof shed. The simplicity of construction, and the thought that it would be nice to experience the whole sky (including the odd meteor, satellite or approaching rain cloud appealing). This idea was scrapped due to the need to shield the telescope from local security lights. The next idea was a rotating octagon based "dome" type structure. This consisted of squares and triangles of plywood over a timber or welded steel frame. Hinged opening sections for shutters were to rotate on top of a 3m square base structure. With this idea in mind, I commenced work and acquired a very rigid 230mm diameter 9mm thick walled mild steel pipe and some flanges.

A local retired engineer welded the flanges, capped off the bottom and welded several steel bars to the lower part of the pipe to aid its anchorage in concrete. Another friend blast cleaned and primed the steel pipe.

A pit was dug to hold nearly a cubic metre of concrete to support the pipe (to the amazement of my daughter Amy).

I constructed a timber spider shaped rig over the pit and bolted the pipe to it so it hung in the correct upright position. The concrete was then poured into the pit and compacted around the pipe at the same time as I poured the foundations for the house extension.

Apart from painting the pipe with some extra coats of protective paint finished in a deep blue gloss matched to the LX200 tube colour, the observatory would have to wait while the house extension was built. At this stage I’m sure the neighbours speculated about the emerging structure. From the neighbour's eye view, it probably looked like I was building an unusual water feature or an oil-drilling rig, either way they were probably expecting some men in white coats to arrive and take me away!

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