The modifications to the telescope frame have been carried out and I’ve just bolted all the furniture to it to check it all hangs together properly – fortunately, it does. The two open sides of the frame have now been covered by 8mm Aluminium sheet to further strengthen the frame and hopefully this will prevent any flexure in the frame itself. The top plate has been drilled and tapped to take both a finder scope and the main guide scope (Megrez 80mm) which is held in scope rings. Finally the bottom plate has been drilled so that the telescope frame can bolt directly to the Paramount’s versa-plate. I have removed the Losmandy dovetail plate completely from the baseplate so there is no chance of flexure at that particular point on the frame.
I have just posted plans for the new all Aluminium pier for this project to Eric at NTE Poole, so hopefully in the next few weeks I’ll have another critical component delivered to the NFO ready for initial assembly of the system.
