Mini Backyard Observatory - Part 4 скачать в хорошем качестве

Mini Backyard Observatory - Part 4

In this video we finish construction on the observatory pier! In order to finish the pier, we need to figure out two important questions. First, how do we connect the mount to the top of the concrete pier and second, how tall do we need the pier to be. To connect the pier to the mount, we will implement a pier top plate. This is usually a piece of steel that bridges the gap between the bottom of the mount and the top of the pier. The best way to get a pier top plate is to pickup a professionally machined one from Dan's Pier Top Plates: https://www.pierplates.com/ Due to the low cost of this build however, we are going to build one in the video. I started with a 6"x6" .25" think steel from eBay (there are ton's of sellers, just run search). To make the plate, we need to drill one hole in the center that will connect to the bottom of the mount and four holes around the edges that will connect to threaded rod that will be sunk into the top of the concrete. The plate will bolt to the four threaded rods using nuts and washers. The second question is how tall to make the pier. You first need to decide how you want to park your mount. If you want to always park in the "home" position (counterweight-down) you will need a shorter pier so that the roof can clear the top of the scope when opening and closing. This ensures that regardless of the telescope position, the roof can close without causing a collision. The downside is that the walls of the observatory will block more of the sky from view (since the pier is lower in the building). The other way to do it is to park with a completely horizontal scope and counterweight. This gives you the maximum pier height and therefore the maximum view of the sky with the clear downside that the scope MUST be in this position for the roof to open or close without colliding with the scope/mount. For this build I decided to park the mount with a horizontal scope and counterweight shaft to maximize my view of the sky. When you calculate the height of the pier, I landed on 34" from ground to top of pier top plate.