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The Radcliffe Observatory


kirkster501

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Commencing the new observatory today.  My AP career is going nowhere unless I can get my observatory going.  I am going to either buy or build a roll-off roof, 9 feet wide and 10 feet in length.  The roof will only roll off 8 feet leaving 2 feet overhanging the desk in the obs.  I don't need a warmroom, I'll never use it.  If it's clear I am either observing with the Dob or inside and connected via RealVNC.

The first step is marking out, clearance and digging the hole for the peer.  This is going to be quite a long project!  I'll take a ton of photos all the way. I  had to finish early today due to family commitments.  I'l add more site details later.

Todays task:  Digging out for the peer.   The whole is 25 inches deep and 15 wide in very tough clay.  I think this will be ample depth

The site. marked out:

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The peer hole.  In very tough clay:

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Went for a run this morning and guess what I found in the ditch beside the A52?  A nice piece of 160mm drain pipe. :)  The pipe is about seven feet long.

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Also dug up the grass and laid the paving slabs loosely into place to give me a feel for the dimensions.  I need to dig out a bit more before i put hardcore down and then mortar these slabs into place.  When concreted down these slabs will be where the main timbers (underside coated with bitumen) will sit.  Going to builders merchant on Wednesday for a ton of ballast, half  ton of foundation hardcore base and a ton of gravel I am going for 9ft x 9ft.   Also loosely put the drain pipe that I found this morning into the hole I excavated yesterday.

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Steve,

Good luck with the build will follow with interest, loads of advice here and the members are really helpful. Lots of pics is always good as it reminds us of the pain we all went through building our Obsy . Best thing I ever did to help me get out more and really take on the demon of imaging. :)

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Nice hole and neat job with the turf and slabs Steve. I thought I'd replied to this thread a few days back, but must have pressed the wrong buttons ;-) Will keep an eye on the progress.

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Congratulations on starting your observatory build. I've started a thread on mine as well recently so if you come across any helpful tips during the build please send them my way.

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Just had a weekend of back breaking work!  I am building the observatory base and dug out the foundations for that and put some slabs around it to get an idea of the size i need.  I am also landscaping the side of my house too.

I dug out this:

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And now have a side patio I am working on (all concreted down and mixed by hand) and you can see at the top - to the south - where the obs will go.  These are not properly concreted down yet - next weekend's job....!

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I also drilled out some 200mm disks to make the pier adapter - a work in progress.  Did this on Sunday morning when it was raining heavily in Nottingham

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Great progress Steve and really like the compass rose patio - was this a custom design or did you find this as a set? Pretty certain that you will have this accurately aligned and that many members would like one of these!

I can sympathise with the back ache from hand mixing - though hopefully short lived and well worth it in the long run. Once you have the ground works and foundations poured the build itself is a real pleasure ;-)

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Thanks Jake, the compass rose is very nice.  I bought it as a set and it is the Stonemarket Truststone Nautical star.  I also added the widening radius set to make it 2.84 mm in diameter.  I bought the lot from the local Builder's merchants in Nottingham.   It has lovely hues of red, blue and grey not visible on this picture because it was filthy in cement dust (still is!).  I'm waiting for a dry day to get it pointed up.  I hope this coming weekend to install 49 paving slabs in a square of 10x10ft (at the top of the picture), each 450mm in length for the obs to sit on.  I will tell the next owner of the house that it will be a great base for a greenhouse ;)

Note in the top picture i also drilled though the house wall into my study where my network is and have run 12m of 40mm waste conduit from there to the obs (under the new patio and feature near the clothes drier).  I will thread through that conduit 2 x Cat5e Ethernet cables, an armoured mains cable and a 6 pair cable for an alarm sensor.  The mains will run to a 2 way consumer unit in the obs and at the house end will just be a plug.  I will wire all this up myself and when I move will pull the the mains back to leave no trace of it :)

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Thanks for the compass rose links - perhaps for my next one!   I built my patio as <2.3m square from 25 slabs, which is just enough for my dome, though too tight for a roll off with warm room,  3.1m square will make a huge difference for a few home comforts!

Not ideal to run the cat5 with power, but very unlikely to cause significant noise on such short data runs, especially with low power demands for the observatory.   Not breaking regs to wire it back to a plug, though worth checking you're RCD protected on the supplying ring main.

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Your observatory sounds as though it will be great. I live in R-O-T but have no  place for an observatory as the middle of the lawn is not considered suitable. I have thought of all sorts of ways around this, but the only possible solution would be an observatory where the whole thing could be moved out when in use and then back when not. I can't imagine that this is possible so will continue to move telescopes out of the shed and then back in again, which is not doing my back a great deal of good. If you have any good ideas please let me know.  Good luck with your work.

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Not ideal to run the cat5 with power, but very unlikely to cause significant noise on such short data runs, especially with low power demands for the observatory.   Not breaking regs to wire it back to a plug, though worth checking you're RCD protected on the supplying ring main.

True but the data rates are low and, as you say, the power requirements are very modest.  Cat5E is rated to 100m and I am less than 20m.  I think it will be good and if not I can run over powerline adapters instead.   I will run two Cat5E's in case something in the future could be powered with PoE one day, a small CCTV camera possibly for remote security.

Deffo RCD!!!!!!

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I like the idea of digging holes for burying peers.  :grin:  (Ooops, no politics on SGL but this is a joke which is bound to appeal to a superannuated English teacher like me...) I'm sure the pier will be alive and well. Forgive me, mods.

Those who've followed your posts for some time will be so happy to see your daughter here in radiant smile. I breathed a deep sigh when I saw her supervising her dad. She will, without doubt, see to it that you get it right! Who needs SGL?

Best,

Olly

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