WOW! Without the help of Mr. Forbes I would have been in a very tight, uncomfortable and just plain NASTY place with IOPTRON after getting a bum unit that was repaired x1 and then damaged and totally unuseable after it was shipped back to me in the styrofoam peanuts. Getting middle management at IOPTRON to expedite my concern and sending me a new unit was a nightmare, The Technical expert at IOPTRON was a nice and caring guy; I would ONLY chooose TRAPEZIUM as a vendor in the future because of Mr. Forbes professional attitude and constantly being available.

Last night, one of my good clients and good friend, Bob Gaskin, sent me some images that he had just taken while using his Mini Tower. Please, note that his MT does have the Timken Bearing Upgrade and is no longer a stock unit. I just wanted to make certain that this was clear.

Bob has been working in the AP field for quite some time. He has a web page that shows some of the most outstanding work that I have ever seen. Much of it was done with an Astro-Physics AP-900 GEM. He has some extremely nice telescopes and a high end SBIG astro-camera. With that in mind it is no wonnder that he has produced some remarkable images. His web site can be found here: http://gaskin-astro.org/blog/

Last night, Bob decided to “experiment” with his Stellarvue 80 mm refractor and the Mini Tower. He mounted up his camera and did a rough alignment. He then told the mount to go to M31 and it was, of course, dead center in the FOV. He started imaging with 30 seconds being his exposure time. After 40 images were taken he then processed them with one of the CCDTools programs. I think it was CCD-Stacks. I’m not perfectly certain since I don’t have that software and I am not an imager myself, yet. I think that Bob intends to change that last part in the near future. LOL

The images below are of the setup that he used last night in his driveway in Northwest Florida.

MT-80mm-SBIG

Another picture of Bob's rig

One more image of Bob's set up

Bob finished the processing and then called me on the telephone. He sounded rather excited and asked if I had checked my e-mail. I had literally just walked in the door and was only opening my first e-mail. I jumped up to his note and opened it up. This image is what I saw.

I could see why Bob was so excited. This image was beautiful! The fact that it was done with a small scope and the Mini Tower just made it that much more impressive. Bob then told me that he had not had to do ANY corrections over the 40+ minute session of imaging. He very specifically pointe out that the stars were pin points and that the Mini Tower had never drifted even once. He also told me that it was tracking as accurately as his AP-900 would track. Now THAT floored me! I knew the MT was a good mount, but, to have it track and image as well as a mount that has a base cost of TEN TIMES MORE was just remarkable!

Bob then told me he was now working on the Double Cluster and that he would send the final image of it when he was done processing it. I, however, had been up since 0500 and it was now 2300 hrs. I was beat and needed some sleep. I went to bed knowing that the morning e-mail would bring another nice image. This is the image that I received.

The Double Cluster in Perseus

There you have it folks! The Mini Tower is a most capable and versitile mount. There is, in my opinion, nothing that can come close to it for double or maybe even triple the price! The only way to get this performance is with an expensive GEM. I find it truly amazing that this little $800.00 ($1100.00 with the Timken Bearing Upgrade) can match a mount that sells for nothing less than 10 times the cost! I am extremely proud of the mount that we provided to Bob and even more proud of the people at iOptron for creating this remarkable product. Of course, I am also extremely proud to be one of the vendors that is allowed to offer this incredible mount to the astronomy community. I’m just wondering what iOptron has up their sleeves that will top this? I can’t wait to find out!

Clear skies to all,

Steve Forbes

Tonight was a special night. One of the more rare events for us occurred. The four Galilean Moons went out of sight. Two went behind Jupiter and two went in front of it. So, for several hours none of them were visible.

The weather here in Hillsboro, NH was actually pretty bad for astronomy tonight. The humidity was off the scale. The sky was milky and bright. The fog and dew were a constant hindrance, too. We were using the hair dryers more than a beauty parlor!

In spite of this we had the 4” f/15 Jaegers once more mounted upon our Mini Tower. This was supported by our Atlas tripod. I have been working on improving the stability of the set up and I’m close to having all of the bugs worked out. I am now convinced that a Hargreaves strut will fix the wobble that I encounter when focusing the telescope. Once focused, though, the mount and scope track perfectly. Once we were locked onto Jupiter we never had to make any adjustments. We had the power racked up to around 300x and when the sky would settle down the views were just stunning.

My son, Stephen, was using our club C14 on the Titan GEM. He was quite surprised that the 4” Jaegers presented a better view than did the C14. I’m of the opinion that the optics in the C14 are not that great which may have had a lot to do with it. Of course, when the seeing is less than perfect a smaller scope will usually do better. This is because it samples less of the atmosphere. Also, a refractor is inherently more thermally stable than a SCT.

We watched as the moons disappeared from sight. Soon after the last one was out of sight a shadow appeared on the surface of Jupiter. We watched as it marched across the face of the planet. We never were able to see the moon that was casting the shadow, though.

In spite of the uncooperative sky the views were great for much of the evening. Every once in a while I would have the Mini Tower slew off to something else. In most cases any object that I selected was just barely visible. Sometimes they just were not visible. I then went back to Jupiter and of course the Mini Tower dropped it right in the center of the EP.

The experiment was for all practical purposes a roaring success. With the Timken Bearing Upgrade the Mini Tower is capable of handling a much larger load than the factory rating. The Jaegers weighs in at about 25 – 26 pounds. There is a 6 pound CW near the EP to help balance the tube around the altitude axle to allow the focuser to clear the tripod legs. The Losmandy CW shaft weighs about 5 pounds and we had a 15 pound Losmandy style CW on that. That makes the total, less eyepieces, about 51 pounds, give or take a little. Not once did the motors sound strained or overloaded. Not once did the clutches slip or the gears skip. The mount tracked Jupiter at dead center for well over two hours and we never touched the controller during that time.

Yes, the Mini Tower is indeed an amazing product. If you need a portable mount with GOTO capability and is as solid as it is reliable, then the Mini Tower with the Timken Bearing Upgrade is well worthy of your investment.

Clear skies to all,

Steve

This evening was actually clear. Last night was too, but, we had plans that kept us from observing. Over the past year, as many of you are aware, we have been doing upgrades to the Mini Tower. We replace the factory bearings with high precision Timken roller bearings. The difference is actually quite impressive. Don’t get me wrong since the factory bearings are good for what was intended. The Mini Tower was intended to be a very high quality Grab-N-Go mount. For that it has no competition. However, some of us like to push the limits. I am one of those people. The new bearings have allowed us to use heavier instruments than ever thought possible. They also allow for better targeting and less vibration at very high power. In fact, we have on many occasions, loaded the upgraded mounts with double the weight that is considered the limit by the designers. In addition, our upgraded mounts work in the EQ mode. The factory units simply cannot function in that mode because the bearings are not up to the task.

Tonight we achieved my personal Holy Grail. We mounted my 1965 4” f/15 Jaegers refractor on a modified Mini Tower. Until we made some changes which included the Timken bearings this was just not possible. It isn’t the weight that was the problem. It was the moment arm, or, length of the telescope itself. On all previous attempts the long tube would strike the tripod legs. If we moved the OTA forward in the rings far enough to clear the legs then the entire thing would over load the clutches or cause the worm gear to push clear of the worm wheel. The noise that this makes is quite startling to say the least.

As I mentioned, we had to make some further changes internally before we could get the OTA to work. We also needed to add a temporary weight to the eyepiece end to help achieve a good balance. That was what really made things work well.

Tonight, we set up the upgraded Mini Tower on our heavy duty tripod which originally came with my Atlas GEM. The Atlas has found a new home, but, the tripod has remained. This is quite similar to the new 2” tripod that is included with the just announced Mini Tower Pro. Actually, almost all tripods of this size and design look darned close to identical. After all, there is only so much that one can do with a tripod.

The first image shows the OTA mounted on the Mini Tower as it is sitting upon the Atlas tripod. I also installed a tripod extension to raise the mount up to gain the needed clearance for the eyepiece end of the OTA. It also helps to get the EP up to a more comfortable viewing position. It was still necessary to sit in a chair when observing near the Zenith, but, at least we didn’t need to kneel in the dirt any more. With a shorter OTA then this becomes even more comfortable.

4 inch f/15 Jaegers on an UPGRADED Mini Tower.

Note in the photograph that we have replaced the small factory CW shaft with one that allows us to use a Losmandy CW. That weight is about 12 pounds. I should have used more, but, I forgot to bring a second one. OK. I THOUGHT that I had forgotten to bring a second Losmandy CW. It was hiding in the bed of the truck. Ooops! Regardless, the Jaegers has a weight of about 25 pounds. The extra ballast that is held at the EP end with duct tape is another 7 pounds. The DW shaft is about 4 pounds and the CW is 12 pounds. That is a total load of 48 pounds! Like I said, just about double the factory recommended limits!

Notice the Losmandy CW and shaft?

We leveled everything after all of the equipment was in place. The power was turned on and we set off to look at Jupiter. Since we did not go to the trouble of doing a proper north-south alignment the mount was off a bit. Not a problem. I just slipped the OTA against the clutches and Jupiter popped right into the EP. I used the SYNC command to center and lock in the alignment then headed off to M27. It was well within the FOV of the 2” 26mm SWA EP that I had installed into the focuser. I did the SYNC command once more and then started roaming around the sky. Every item was well within the FOV. The sky conditions were rather hazy and the Moon was making the seeing even worse. Still, we hit everything that we called up. We went to M13, M3, M15, M31, M103, M76, M56, M57, and on and on. The mount moved that 4” f/15 OTA around like it wasn’t even there!

While Stephen and I were doing this, Rags was popping off objects with his 13” f/4.5 DOB. He was finding things by star hopping and using charts. We just kept banging off objects with our trusty little GOTO controller on our upgraded Mini Tower.

Shortly after we had begun our observing session, Jupiter went behind a small tree and was not visible for about 90 minutes. Once it was again visible we sent the upgraded Mini Tower over to it and then jacked up the power. We played with a number of EPs, but, the best image was seen with an old Edmund 12.5 mm Orthoscopic and a 2x TeleVue Barlow. We used a TMB 6 mm Super Planetary EP and kept swapping between the two. The Edmund EP edged out the TMB with more contrast and more details visible. During this time we never had to re-center the image. The upgraded Mini Tower held the Jaegers right on target the entire time. We did find that focusing was a bit of a challenge because the old rack and pinion unit that is currently on the OTA just doesn’t work too well. It will soon be replaced with a newer two speed Crayford style focuser.

That's dew on the OTA!

We finally decided that the viewing conditions had deteriorated enough to call it a night. Also, Rags needed to get some sleep because he had to go to work in the morning as do we. The mount was sent to the park position and we dismantled the equipment, put it all back into the bed of the truck and headed home.

The whole point of this “experiment” is to prove that the Mini Tower is much more capable than ever imagined. With our upgrades it can equal or beat a number of EQ mounts that are quite popular. Additionally, there is not ONE Alt/Az mount with GOTO capabilities that can even come close to the upgraded Mini for any money.

Now, for the next step in the evolution of the Mini Tower, we are looking at more powerful motors! This should be even more fun!!

CS

Steve

Mike was not able to get this to post earlier so I’m putting it up for him. He originally entered this into the comments section of “I’m a bad boy!” Here is what he wrote:

This is my first entry ever to any blog so I hope this goes to the right place. House calls? Customer support? Integrity? Tech savvy? Above and beyond the call of duty? I wouldn’t be surprised if most people needed to google these terms. But they are alive and well in the person of Steve Forbes and company. For me it began with an open plea for help on the web over a year ago. I had purchased an old MotoTrak V to be part of an autoguiding array for my old Meade DS16 (the only thing that would fit the bill). I couldn’t get the dec buttons to work correctly. After drawing many blanks from around the astro world, I finally heard from Steve that he could definitely be of help. His message radiated confidence. I felt immensely relieved that someone actually knew what I was up against. I quickly sent the unit to Trapezium and they fixed it. Or so we all thought. When I hooked it up again same problem. Steve took it back with no hesitation. It seemed to work again. Then there came a long winter of inactivity. The following summer I had to disassemble the whole rig in order to make mods to the mount (another story!). When I tested the whole set-up, guess what didn’t work. Now I hadn’t spoken with Steve for more than 6 months, but I didn’t know who else to turn to. Without a nanosecond of hesitation, Steve insisted on making a house call. A house call? It’s about a 5 hour trip! And I am in the middle of nowhere (good dark skies). As an answer to a prayer Steve appeared with his son Steve(smart?!)and proceeded to the patient. They first discovered that yours truly had inserted the dec motor plug into the focuser (or was it the reticle?) input. Clever, huh? The ghost seemed to be exorcised. But when the remaining cables were all reconnected, the ghost reappeared. Did I mention “persistence?” Steve and Steve wouldn’t quit. They finally tracked down the ghost in the machine in the form of a wrong type of cable. That’s why the unit worked in their shop, but not in my system. I kept connecting this stupid (do I have a lot to learn!)cable and sabotaging the MotoTrak. We then spent the next 3 hours over dinner (it was the least I could offer)talking about this, that, and everything else. Then these angels of mercy got in their truck and headed back to New Hampshire. What a visit!
The moral of this tale is that these guys are much more than any ordinary businessmen. They are like the pioneer neighbors of old who would drop everything to run and put out a barn fire and then to help build a new one the next morning. Many thanks to you, Steve!
ps. When I get some decent photos I will try to post them asap.

michael hamburg

So the Mini Tower is not capable of serious scientific work? I DON’T THINK SO!!!

Yesterday, 27-August-2009, another occultation of Antares by the Moon occurred at 2101 UT. Unfortunately, our club announcement was not posted until around the middle of the day and I had no idea about the event until the first news note popped up in the email. YIKES! Time to get moving!

I plotted the event and found a clear site right on the center line that was only about 15 miles from my house. Unfortunately, it was right along side of a major highway! Uh-oh! Also, our only working Astro-camera, a modified web cam, was on loan to a friend who lives about 40 miles away! Houston! We have a problem! A brain storm hit almost instantly! I’d better get moving before I set off the smoke alarms!!

I called my friend David Gilmore (a.k.a. Rags) and asked if he had a camera that I could use for this event. I was originally thinking of his video camera, but, he told me there was no way to couple it to a telescope. However, he did tell me that he had an adapter that would allow his Nikon DSLR to be mounted to his C8. GREAT! I have my own C8 so I could have one imaging and the other as a visual guide scope. They would be a matched set so I would be seeing exactly what the camera would be seeing. EXCELLENT!

First, I would like to make note that I have never in my life used a DSLR! I grew up with manual film cameras. I do have nice little Pentax pocket camera that has served me well since I bought it. It has been to Iraq twice and even though it looks as if it has been in a war zone it is still working perfectly. I just could not use it with my telescopes because there is no way to hook it up.

I drove over to Rags’ place and he gave me the fastest lesson in using this type of camera in history. OK. I think I got it. So, I packed his gear into the truck with my gear, which was still there from last night and headed to the site.

Upon my arrival, I found that the satellite images from Maps.Yahoo.com were severely outdated!! The area that I had selected was now overgrown! ARRRRRRRRRGH!! OK. I looked at the images and map and started driving around. I still had some time so all was not lost, yet. There was the State Highway Garage, but, the gates were locked and I couldn’t find anyone around. I finally found a perfect site that was about 1 mile west of where I wanted to be located. In fact, it was the ONLY place that was open and accessible. Everything else was either tree covered or oriented so that the Moon was not visible.

The spot that I finally found was located right off of State Route 9. It was the exit ramp to Granite Lake Road in the town of town of Munsonville, NH. I drove through Munsonville looking for a place closer to the center line. I would have missed the town if I had blinked. I like towns like that! Anyway, I parked my truck along side of the exit ramp and began setting up. I had hoped to get to Latitude N43.013029, Longitude -72.14166, which is 0.05 Km from path center. Instead, according to the map, the location I used is at Latitude N43.006035, Longitude -72.15800, which is 1.394 Km from path center. The GPS in the Mini Tower showed the same coordinates. Even though I had to climb a short slope to get to level ground, it was perfect! I had little choice anyway since there were no immediate options.

The location

I lugged the gear up the slope and got the Mini Tower set up and leveled. I ran AC power from the truck to the site and then started mounting the OTAs. Using the secondary Vixen style saddle plate that is standard with all Mini Towers I mounted Rags’ C8. His C8 has an ADM Accessories Vixen dovetail. Mine was on the main Losmandy style saddle plate since my C8 has an ADM Accessories Losmandy style dovetail. The Mini Tower secondary saddle plates do not come with the Allen leveling screws installed. We install them on every Mini Tower that comes to us. To our knowledge, we are the ONLY ones who do this. If we had not done so I could never have aligned the two OTAs. By using these screws and rotating the saddle plate around the CW axle I was able to perfectly align both C8 optical paths in only about one minute. The GPS had locked on and I had synchronized to the Moon. I was ready!

The set up

I mounted the DSLR to the back of Rags’ C8 and had no idea how to focus it! I could see nothing on the view screen on the back. I had completely forgotten that this camera was a through the lens camera and in a mild panic called Rags on the cell phone. Yeah! For ONCE I actually had a signal on that horrible thing! Verizon has the absolute worst coverage in NH, bar none! That’s another story for another time. Rag’s reminded me that it was just like the SLRs of old and once I looked through the view finder I was back in action. Even so, focusing these things is not easy when looking at something such as the Moon, through a C8, in daylight, while wearing eye glasses! I managed to get a few test images that looked promising and settled down to wait for the event.

The time is near!

A local police officer that was off duty happened to notice me and all of my gear up on the bank along side of the exit ramp. He stopped over to see what was up. I introduced myself, handed him one of my business cards and told him what was going on. He was intrigued. I had him look through My C8 which was set for visual use and after some effort he was able to see Antares which by now was not too far from the Moon. At this time, the ONLY cloud in the sky just happened to move right in front of the Moon! This same thing happened to us on the last occultation! I was not thrilled to say the least. Officer Pope of the Antrim, NH Police Department was smiling as I shook my fist at the obnoxious cloud. He had seen enough, the Moon was behind the cloud and he decided to politely excuse himself and go about his business. Shortly after he left, the clouds started to move away. They weren’t completely gone, but, it was enough that I had some hope of seeing the event as well as getting some images of it.

Antares was now quite close. The event was near. I took a few pictures and when I tried to change the shutter speed the camera wouldn’t respond! OH NO! NOT NOW! I called Rags, again and told him what was happening. He tried to help me go through the commands as best he could. He had only used the camera a few times and was trying very hard to remember how things worked on it. We finally got it working, again. So, I was able to get back to the task at hand.

At 1701 hours local time, just as the graze began, my friend Paul Cezanne called on the cell phone. He was down on Cape Cod and was trying to see the event with some of his club members. I was looking through the EP and started yelling at him, “There it goes! It’s back! It’s behind another mountain! It’s back again! I’m trying to take images! I’ll call you later!” then hung up! Actually, I think we were both kind of yelling at each other about seeing it or not seeing it, but, everything went so fast that I don’t clearly remember. I threw the phone to the ground and started taking more pictures.

It was now 1718 hours local time and the event was over almost as soon as it began, or, so it seemed. It certainly felt as if it had taken longer, but, the clock doesn’t lie. Throughout the event I was able to watch as Antares disappeared and reappeared and still was able to take some pictures. I could only hope that at least one would come out. Since I had no idea how to call up the images and review them on the LCD screen I just kept snapping away until about 1720 hours. At this point I decided it was time to break things down and head for Rags’ place to see what results, if any, I had achieved.

I got to his place about an hour later and we went down to his computer to unload the images. Once we had them on the computer we started to look and found that I had actually managed to get some images. Not only did I get them, some of them were pretty good. Some even showed Antares just as it was passing behind a mountain! YIPEE! Here are some of the results. Apparently, there were still some wispy clouds around. I just didn’t notice them until after we downloaded the images.

Getting close!

Antares is just slipping behind a mountain.

Antares reappears

Antares touches another mountain.

Antares is back again.

Antares almost disappears.

Antares is back and bright.

Going behind another mountain.

Back once more.

Once more Antares dims behind a mountain.

Antares shines very brightly again.

The above images are the better of the lot. I have a number of them. They show pretty much the same thing. At one point I messed up the focus on the C8 and a few of the images are just too embarrassing to show. However, this game of hide and seek went on for several minutes. However, as with all things, it came to an end too soon. I watched Antares drift further and further from the Moon. I finally decided that it was time to pack it in and go see what I had managed to capture.

After Rags had moved the images to the thumb drive on my key chain I headed for home feeling very tired, but, very satisfied. I, the Village Idiot, had actually managed to get some good images with a camera that I had no clue how to run using a set up that many have said would not work for such an event. I believe that this proves the extreme portability and capabilities of the Mini Tower. I was able to jump up, run to a site, set up in virtually no time with some heavy equipment and get the results for which I could only hope. That is exactly one of the things for which the Mini Tower was designed. So, yes, the Mini Tower has once again proven that it is probably the best and most capable of the Grab-N-Go mounts on the market, bar none!

CS

Steve

Recently, we spent some time with a friend who showed us a fantastic new item. We are thrilled to be the first to announce this item! WHOA! Wait a minute! We’re not telling you what it is, yet! LOL We just wanted to get your attention! Soon, though, VERY SOON, we will be rocking the astronomical community with something for which so many have been begging. This is a culmination of all of our hard work as well as the hard work of others. The results will be well worthy of the wait!

So, now that I’ve teased you thoroughly, keep an eye on theb BLOG because it won’t be long before you will be able to personally realize the next step in the evolution of amateur astronomy!

For now, it’s back to the Trap-Cave to further plan for this wonderful new product!

Clear skies,

Steve

I just went through the list of users that have signed up to our BLOG and found that some were not able to make entries. I’m still learing how to run this thing so you will need to bear with me as I slowly become more knowledgeable about maintaining a BLOG.

Anyway, for those that were not able to make and entry, please, try again. If you still cannot do so then drop a short note to me and I will fix the problem. We truly wish to have all of our friends be able to present their comments about the Mini Tower as well as other equipment. Tell us what you have, what you are doing, etc. Of course, photographs are always welcome!

Thanks to all and clear skies,

Steve

I towed my pop-up camper north to Crowell, TX, and on to the Three Rivers Foundation’s CSAC last Saturday. It is Disneyland for astronomers! My van was loaded with equipment from the night before. I observed until 3AM Saturday morning, tried to get some sleep, then drove to 3RF.

Main Entrance

Classroom and Dome

Jeff introduced me to the volunteers, then took a visiting geologist from Texas Tech on a walking tour of the 50 acre property. We relaxed on the classroom porch in rockers telling all our tall stories until catered pizzas were delivered at 6:30PM.

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Pizza Time!

The star field is well-designed with individual power posts for each observing location.

Star Field

The classroom offers a cool break from the 104F afternoon heat. It is a great place to process images, or check email. Yes, 3RF provides excellent wi-fi throughout the facility!

One Class You Don't Want to Skip

Butterfly Garden

Guests began to arrive in the early evening for the monthly public star party. I think the gate count was over 100. Kids lined up to sit in my couch potato telescope chair. (This is a Sim Pichoup-designed beach chair with 20X80 binos attached) I set up my Mini Tower in A/A mode and shot a widefield of M8, M20, and M21. 13X45 seconds under a black velvet sky with the C8, Hyperstar3 and QHY8 OSC.

It was a great time for all. I am going back this weekend for the Lunar Star Party. Check out http://www.3rf.org for more information on this treasure in the Texas ranch country.

John Bozeman

I got this great little proto-type scope last year. It has been an incredible little instrument to say the least. It is a 102mm f/7 achromatic refractor and originally came with a less than acceptable 2″ rack and pinion focuser. However, the optics are incredible! Over the past year this OTA has wowed many people and took a lot of rough handling. It has been a real trooper.

Fresh out of the box.

My son, Stephen, has been using it for imaging and the focuser was giving us both fits. It was just not capable of reaching or holding a good focus. The lens was too precise and the low quality rack and pinion focuser just was not up to the quality of the lens. So, I grabbed a really nice two speed focuser off of the shelf and decided that it was time for an upgrade.

On the Mini Tower

First, I dismantled everything. I then made up the adapter assembly to allow this high quality focuser to be mounted to the OTA. When I was getting ready to put things together I took notice of just how badly the paint had been scratched, so, I decided to paint the OTA. I WAS just going to go with the same white that was the original color. However, I’ve had this Kameleon paint sitting around from another job and it was just screaming to be used. The more I thought about it the more I liked it.

The original paint was very well bonded to the metal so I used it as a base for the primer coat. Of course, since the original was a rough and textured finish, I decided to sand it smooth. That was easy. Then began the process of laying down the primer, wet sanding, more primer, wet sand again, fill the small small scratches, wet sand, primer, wet sand and on and on until the base was the way I wanted it to be. I decided it would be much nicer for the adapter to match the OTA instead of just painting it a gloss black. So, that too went through the process of primer, wet sand, etc.

The color coat went on well. Several coats provided the depth and color shift that I wanted. Once that was dry then came the top coats. After the first few coats went on I needed to wet sand it with a 1500 grit paper, let it dry and shoot some more. I repeated this process for at least 8 coats. The final coat came out just fine so I stopped with that one. The finder OTA was also done at the same time. However, with the accuracy of the Mini Tower upon which this is so often used, the finder has not been used in a long time. Therefore, I’ve not mounted it on the main tube, yet.

Once everything was finished all that was needed was to reassemble everything. I cleaned all of the threads on the OTA and lens cell. Stephen cleaned the main lens and all went together without a hitch. I’m quite pleased with the results.

New paint

New paint - 2

New paint - 3

I think it looks great and the color shift is something to behold. It really is stunning in the sunlight. The Kameleon paint shifts colors as the light angle changes and no two paint jobs are every exactly the same. Photographs just cannot do this paint justice. Kameleon paint is not cheap. In fact, this is about $300.00 worth of paint! Still I like it and it makes the scope a true one of a kind OTA. I hope that everyone likes the way this turned out.

Let me know what you think.

Clear skies,

Steve