This project will consist of a 22" f/2.8 meniscus mirror made out of BVC, and a telescope based around it. The 22" is to replace my 24" scope, which I sold in 2022. The blank weighs only 38 pounds, which is not the lightest but it’s better than the 60 pounds of the 24". It’s 1" thick with a 0.5" deep curve (sagitta) so it acts about as stiff as a 1.5" thick typical blank, which most people would consider fairly reasonable. I could’ve gone thinner but wanted to alleviate the risk seeing as it’s already going to be the largest and most difficult mirror I’ve ever done.

Mk 25, latest version

My “small” Dobsonian telescope. Constructed and modified between December 2019 and January 2023, with updates still ongoing, this instrument is designed to do everything: wide-field vistas, sharp planetary views, and deep views of galaxies and globular clusters. The primary mirror is 0.8" thick quartz and made by Nova Optical. The secondary is a 3.1" Antares unit, accurate to 1/20 wave.

The whole telescope is just 45 pounds, and fits in my passenger seat if I need it to. It can be assembled in as little as five minutes. Before I moved to Tucson it also had an equatorial platform for motorized, hands-free tracking - something all my other scopes lack. With a 21mm Ethos eyepiece, I can get a 1.7-degree true field of view - 3.5 full Moons across! Currently working on the 30th revision to it, featuring a new mirror cell.

24-Inch f/3.5 Dobsonian Telescope

My largest telescope so far, with a primary mirror made by Nova Optical. I got the primary at a steep discount thanks to a small edge chip. Other than the 25" Obsession at WAS, my 24" was the largest telescope in Connecticut while I lived there.

The original scope weighed about 200 pounds and was transported in my Toyota Sienna minivan with a pneumatic tire/wheelbarrow handle system and handicap ramps. Setup time was roughly 30 minutes. The eyepiece is almost always reachable with little more than a short step stool and is low enough to stand on the ground about 50% of the time.

V1 (2017)

This was my first homemade telescope, and the only one I currently possess with a homemade mirror.. I ground and polished the mirror myself in August 2017 when I was 14 years old. The mirror is very good, but none of the structures I threw it in were anything resembling decent - though it did win 1st place Junior award at Stellafane 2018. I had a lot of good views with it, but dismantled it after a while. This scope made it into Sky & Telescope in September 2018.

Restoration Projects

1931 JW Fecker 3.5" Restoration

A scope I restored for the Westport Astronomical Society with the help of Dana Weisbrot. Dana tackled the hardware and OTA while I cleaned the optics and legs. The scope works well and provides beautiful images despite its age.

Before

After

Celestron 1972 C8 Tri-Color Restoration

This scope came to me in incredibly bad shape, with dirty optics, a non-functional clock drive, and ruined paint. I restored it to perfect condition in 2019 and repainted it with the help of Dana Weisbrot of Twin Ridge Auto Body (and fellow WAS member). The scope now resides in the hands of Gianluca Carlinci in Italy, along with a 1971 C8 which I also sold to him that awaits a similar restoration.

Builds

20.5-Inch f/4.5 Dobsonian Telescope

A partially unsuccessful project, but an adventure nonetheless. I got a 20.5" BVC primary mirror for free and was told the figure was adequate. As it later turned out, the mirror was absolutely horrible and could not handle powers above around 180x. The construction was also rather shoddy, with bearings that flexed side to side and a truly atrocious mirror cell. The scope was also more or less permanently assembled and could only be used by rolling it out from my garage on wheels. I spray-silvered the primary mirror, and while the coating was ugly, it gave ridiculously bright images - the scope hit 18th magnitude from my Bortle 6 backyard.

Hardwood Furniture

Cherry

I made this cherry coffee table and a cherry end table to go with it for my parents back in 2019. I refinished them in 2024 with more tung oil.

Alder

I made this alder end table in 2022.