AAVSO's Morgan 24" Cassegrain Formerly located at lowell Observatory, Flagstaff Arizona

The rebuilding of the Morgan 24" Cassegrain (click the image for a larger view)

	May 03, 2009 A closer look	This is a closer look at the top of the OTA and gantry crane. There is currently about 18" clearance to the roof but that will change with base lift.
	May 03, 2009 RA gross alignment	The telescope polar end support has been raised to the latatude of the telescope so that measurements can be taken for base lift and clearnce to roof.
	May 03, 2009 Optics in observatory	The two secondary cages with their secondary mirrors and the primary mirror cell with mirror have been place into the observatory awaiting installation.
	May 01, 2009 RA drive assembly	The RA drive assembly has been relocated into the shop in preparation for rebuild and modifications to accept the Siderial Technolgy servo drive control system. New bearings and gears will be installed along with the necessary gear housing fabrication.
	March 08, 2009 Morgan OTA mounted	The telescope tube was remounted without optics for the initial purpose of performing a gross pointing of the RA axis to near the pole and to determing the lift needed to acheive the minimum desired altitude observing angle.
	March 04, 2009< Another at "home" view/td>	This is another view of the Morgan inside the observatory showing more details of the gantry and roof clearance before adjusting the RA axis to polar pointing.
	March 04, 2009 Morgan shell at "home"	The Morgan telescope mount and telescope tube was moved into the completed observatory building along with the 2-ton gantry crane for performing assembly and maintenance.
	2/15/2009 South wall and crank	The south wall is designed to be manaully lowered if for some unusual reason a more southern view is required. The wall segment is about 250 pounds so I installed a charnk hoist to assist in the lowering and raising. Without this assist I can not overcome the angle and weight of the wall. It will lower to a 90 degree down position at which point it contacts and lays across installed support beams.
	1/15/2009 Structure complete	This shows the completed observatory structure. The electrical and Ethernet has been installed and all that remains is to motorize the roof and rebuild the scope inside.
	1/21/2009 Roof sheeting	The roof sheeting has been started. There was quite a delay in this process as the winds were high for the past couple of weeks and handling 3'X10' roof sheetmetal is dangerous in the wind and especially working alone.
	1/14/2009 Truss'	The roof truss' have been installed. From this point it looks as though the inside concrete to roof apex will be approximately 14 feet in height.
	12/19/2009 Roof roll direction	As can be seen in this photo, the roof rolls off to the north towards the control room. The total roof roll is just under 20 feet allowing for the best north view as is possible with the spacing requirements.
	12/19/2009 Roof walls	Here the roof wall sections have been installed making the roof 4 feet taller than the main walls themselves
	12/07/2009 Roof framing	This shows the begining of the roof structure with the roller wheels
	12/04/2009 Roof Rails	The piers for the roof rails and the rails themselves have been installed
	11/19/2008 Framing begins	The basic wall framing and siding has been constructed.
	9/12/08 Poured and curing	This is the completed slab that the Morgan will rest upon. The radian cooling tubes are visible on the northwest end. In the background is the construction effort for the DRO 20" RC observatory building.
	9/10/08 Concrete pouring	With help from Jerry Miller (left) and my son Bryan (right) we are pouring the concrete slab and screeing it off level.
	9/10/08 Concrete arrives	It isn't an easy task to get the concrete truck with 9 yards of concrete up on the ridge but they seem to manage in the mountains just fine.
	9/6/08 Under concrete cooling	I have installed PEX tubing for use as a cooling system for the concrete. I doubt I will need to use this but now is the time to install it just in case.
	9/2/08 Rebar matrix installed	The slab base is smoothed and covered with fine dirt and the rebar matrix is installed.
	8/29/08 Another view	It seems that the concrete block manufacturers that I deal with don't make a block designed to act as a form for a slab. As such I had to manually cut each block to create the form. Here you can see the completed control room and one of the existing 14" telescope roll-off observatories. This is a view to the north.
	8/29/08 Block wall	With the concrete footings poured it was time to build the block wall forms in which to pour the concrete slab.
	8/26/08 Footing trenches	The footings were initially started by hand using a pick and shovel but that quickly came to a halt with the broken pick. Someone put some rocks on top of this ridge, all over it in fact!
	8/26/08 Construction begins	The start of the construction of the 12' X 16' roll-off observatory for the Morgan begins.
	8/2/08 36" RA worm gear	Here is seen the RA worm gear and the declination gear housing. The RA worm gear is a 256 tooth brass-bronze gear about 3 inches thick. The optical telescope tube (OTA) mounting flange is shown with mounting bolts installed.
	6/30/08 Mission accomplished	The happy crew of the unloading party; Jerry Miller, Russ Wright, Tom Smith and Michael Hernandez (left to right).
	6/30/08 Easy does it	The massive mounting is being eased into the shop. This unit weighs in around 1500 pounds as viewed.
	6/30/08 Unloading the beast	After the removal of the OTA the telescope mounting was unloaded into the DRO shop for storage and rebuild.
	6/25/08 Tom and the scope	Tom Smith, Director of Dark Ridge Observatory, poses with the newly arrived Morgan 24" telescope.
	6/25/08 The shop and home	This perspective shows the shop in the immediate background and further on is the observatory location.
	6/25/08 1st day onsite	Arrives for rebuild and placement on the Dark Ridge Observatory's ridge top in Weed, New Mexico.

Last update May 03, 2009