4 people. This evening, we disassembled the telescope in preparation for its repair. The project started out on shaky footing tonight, when I had to go into the crawlspace and get the packing materials we'd thoughtfully stowed 4 years ago. Trust me, you don't want to go in there.

I discovered that the bottom of the boxes had completely rotted away, and were unusable. Plastic foam is a lot more durable, though, so all the foam inserts are still usable.

It was amazingly nerve-wracking to take the last bolt off the scope and lift it away from the mount. At 125 lbs, it's just heavy enough to do serious damage to itself.

The observing platform, which we didn't yet have when we put the scope in place, made the process much easier than I'd feared. We simply moved the scope onto a platform of boards placed across the platform railing. (Yet another use for the "dim your lights" sign!).

Once the scope was in place, the rest of the mount came down easily. We packed up the parts for shipment, and headed out just as a couple of families came to see something. I gave my sincere apologies to those people, and invited them back next month.

Rest assured the word will go out when we're open once again.

-Les Coleman

Author:

Leslie Coleman

Entry Date:

Oct 3, 2003

Published Under:

Leslie Coleman's Log