So, did you hear about those Girl Scouts kicking ass with their home built telescope? [via] Here I thought they were only about overpriced cookies. The telescope is a “Dobsonian”; a design over 50 years old and named for creator John Dobson. People have been building these long before commercial telescopes were available. Here is a link to a pdf describing how-to build one of these monsters.
[thanks marc melcher]
The first link leads to microsofts site :) there are two http://'s in the link.
I got kicked out of the boy scouts for eating a brownie…
awesome, last night I wished I had a telescope
and today I get instructions on how to build one. SWEET!
boooring, where are the links?!?
This is AWESOME. I’ve been reading ABOUT astronomy for several years but haven’t been able to invest the money in an adequate telescope. I’m going to start building my own immediately.
Joejack for the win!
And props for a mildly suggestive pic to go along with the hack. Any idea how strong these things are? could you use the same principles to build, say…a pair of binoculars?
Dobsonian telescopes have been built in binocular configuration, and although this requires close matching of primary and secondary mirrors, it can be done relatively cheaply. Google “binocular dobsonian telescope” for more information.
guess there’s only one way to figure that out jeremy p, and i think you know what that is!!!
jeremy wants to peek into the windows of girlscouts after they get out of the shower!!!
good idea
Overpriced? Some of those cookies are worth the money, man.
Dobson, the guy the telescope mount is named for, ground and polished his own mirrors from a decommisioned ship’s porthole glass! Check out the San Francisco Side Walk Astronomers site for more info.
word. there are alot of videos on telescope lens making. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dBDuXvejJ9k <—-this is one similar to one i saw a long time ago but instead of metal arms for the grinder, he had built his out of wood. also you can use a kiln and sheet glass stacked on top of each with a fiber blanket ring in the diameter you want to lens and blast that shit together and let it anneal for a day or 2
Zombie thread, perhaps but the link to the Santa Rosa Girl Scouts story has been moved to this URL as of 2015:
http://www.pressdemocrat.com/csp/mediapool/sites/PressDemocrat/News/story.csp?page=0
https://web.archive.org/web/20051126183703/http://pages.sbcglobal.net/raycash/manualv2.pdf