Rolling Roof Observatory

Location: Thousand Oaks, California 91360

Longitude: 118 degrees 52 minutes 21.03 seconds West Latitude:  34 degrees 13 minutes 29.62seconds North

Finally finished the refurbishment of my home observatory last weekend (03/11/2006). I've had this observatory since 1981, but had primarily used it for testing and equipment storage in my 'film days'. My sky is too light polluted  for film work, as the negatives were fogging with exposures of 5 or 6 minutes with the f5 reflectors. See this light pollution link to my observatory.

Using a UHC or Light Pollution filter (with Tech Pan film) did not produce satisfactory results, as the long exposures (~2 hours) tended to lack the contrast that a similar exposure at a dark sky produced.

Optical Tube Assembly's are:

Homemade in 1985; 8 inch f5 Newtonian reflector

Homemade in 1992; 14.5 inch f5 Newtonian reflector

Purchased used from Bob Fera; Celestron 11 Schmidt Cassegrain (black tube)

Mount:

Schaefer AT-120 German Equatorial Mount; purchased new in December 1986

dual axis 60 hertz AC synchronous motors: no GOTO, no slewing, not autoguider compatible

CCD Camera:

 Santa Barbara Instrument Group (SBIG) ST-8XME, purchased new in August 2005

Observatory view looking North

 The big Pine tree in my neighbor's yard prevents me from imaging to the northwest past the meridian, north of about +35 declination

Observatory view looking East (from the park)

This view gives a better impression of the size and proximity of the big pine tree

Observatory view looking West

Notice the pine tree branch just over the fence. It is not directly over the observatory, but is about 10-15 feet to the west. I 'eliminated' this branch late last year (2006), as can be seen from the image above, taken January 6, 2007

This recent (November 8, 2008) view to the West was shot from just over the eastern rail

Observatory view looking to the South

 Tree in my yard (2005) blocks transiting objects at around declination -30 degrees

 Tree (now, 3 years later, it's the Palm tree) in my yard blocks transiting objects at around declination -23 degrees

Wide view of observatory setting taken from the park. Looking East

Horizons due West and East are pretty good, but as you can see from the above images, due north and south are 'somewhat'  compromised

Inside

View of the 8 inch Newtonian with the ST8-XME. The old Lumicon 'non-rotating' helical focuser has been replace with a Starlight Instruments

Feather Touch 2 inch Newtonian focuser. I added the motorized feature the my Feather Touch in early 2007 .... see below for a close-up

Focusing much easier now, using the motorized Feather Touch and FocusMax (free ... by Larry Weber & Steve Brady)

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