Cosmotron

[ArnieVXR]

Anyone here remember Cosmotron (1980s)?

Be interested in any sales literature or pictures of kit that might still be around...

IIRC Phil Horrocks ended up on the receiving end of some threats from Celestron that led to his Yellow fork mounted 8" SCT becoming a Yellow GEM mounted 8" Mak. He also produced a couple of nice 6" reflectors (a GEM and an unusual equatorial fork), examples of which society friends purchased.

(Betting no one here remembers the name)

[HD-AP]

Hi

I remember them cosmotron traded in the early 1980's went bust to be replaced by opticraft ltd making maks as cosmotron violated celestron patents.

Opticraft went bust in the early 1990's used to place ads in astronomy now .

Chris lord wrote a piece entitled so called telescope makers he quite a bit about mr horrocks efforts .

By all accounts few were made and those that exist are said to be poorly made.

Here is a linkhttp://www.brayebrookobservatory.org/BrayObsWebSite/HOMEPAGE/forum/So%20Called%20Telescope%20Makers.html

[John]

I can remember Opticraft and their ads in AN. I was slightly interested for a while. I'm glad I didn't pursue it.

[Peter Drew]

I've known Phil Horrocks for over 30 years. When I first met him I recommended that he made Maksutovs as the only serious competitor was Questar at the time. I had considerable experience with making Maksutovs (mechanics, not optics) and felt that they were a better bet. He pressed on with SCT's and credit should be given that he was able to make the sophisicated optics at all. Sadly few of the products lived up to expectations due more to rushing things to meet deadlines than absolute ability. I worked closely enough to good opticians to know what it took to make good catadioptric optics and was able to give advice on several occasions which seemed to help at least temporarily. Cosmtrom became Opticraft and finally Photon Optics. Phil was certainly good at company names. Phil still calls into the Astronomy Centre when passing, and still maintains an interest in astronomy and tinkering with instrumental projects. 

[ArnieVXR]

Hi Peter,

I had a couple of friends who had six inch newtonians that he built. Both scopes were well made, performed well and were very competitively priced for the era. My favourite was the fork mounted design, as it was both light and compact.

The guys from the SOADAS Observatory Trust picked up a couple of items from him. They seemed happy enough with the big GEM equatorial he put together for a 12-inch reflector. And if I recall correctly, he even built a scope to go around a 7-inch objective for a telescope at Stonyhurst College.

I purchased some fork arms from him for a 12-inch scope I was building. They still sit in my parents' garage, along with other parts I'd collected

Say hello to Phil from me, next time you see him. He won't remember me, I'm sure. Please let him know that his scopes and a visit to his workshop inspired me to continue with what has become a lifelong fascination with astronomy.

Cheers

Andrew Arnold

[mikeDnight]

On 24/10/2014 at 10:00, ArnieVXR said:

Hi Peter,

I had a couple of friends who had six inch newtonians that he built. Both scopes were well made, performed well and were very competitively priced for the era. My favourite was the fork mounted design, as it was both light and compact.

The guys from the SOADAS Observatory Trust picked up a couple of items from him. They seemed happy enough with the big GEM equatorial he put together for a 12-inch reflector. And if I recall correctly, he even built a scope to go around a 7-inch objective for a telescope at Stonyhurst College.

I purchased some fork arms from him for a 12-inch scope I was building. They still sit in my parents' garage, along with other parts I'd collected

Say hello to Phil from me, next time you see him. He won't remember me, I'm sure. Please let him know that his scopes and a visit to his workshop inspired me to continue with what has become a lifelong fascination with astronomy.

Cheers

Andrew Arnold

Sorry I'm replying to your post just over two years late Andrew. I was also inspired by Phil and his scopes back in the early 80's. I was young at the time and couldn't afford a large scope. Phil encouraged me to make my own scope including the optics using his workshop. As the years passed I made several scopes for myself but the one i really wanted, a 6" F15 refractor, kept eluding me. I built the giant German mount with Phil's guidance and the refractor was in production but was sold to someone else. I ended up with a 8" Maksutov on my giant German mount. It looked fantastic but the scope wasn't for me, I wanted a refractor.

I still see Phil regularly and will pass on your king comments about how he encouraged you. He's 81 now but still enjoys playing with scopes and observes with me from time to time. I've attaches a photo of Phil in his observatory from about four years ago. ☺ 

I'd love to collect together some of his mountings from that era. They were incredible things, particularly his German mounts!

I know comments regarding threats by Celestron have been implied, but they are not accurate. Cosmotron was never a threat to Celestron and there would have been nothing Celestron could ever have done to stop him from producing SCT's. Phil's scopes and optics were not copies of Celestron. He changed to producing Maksutov's after pressure from his friends because they were superior to the Schmidt's and easier to make. The trouble was that Phil rushed things too much.

Mike ☺