Starting the thing…

My “small” Dobsonian telescope. Constructed and modified between December 2019 and January 2022, 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.