The Telescope Lifter/Mover Project
Date: July 14th, 2020
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The Genesis of an Idea….
Over the past year, I have gotten more and more involved in Astrophotography - and I have loved every minute of it.
But I do not have an observatory. So for each clear night, I have to drag my heavy equipment out onto the driveway, set it up, level it, polar align it, and get everything ready to go for an evening of imaging. Then, when I am done, often at 5 am, I need to pack everything up and put it all away before I can hit the hay.
I recently brought a second scope online, so now I have two full rigs to set up and take down for each session. I set both up and then run them from inside the house. Double your pleasure, double your fun! (Double your setup and take-down!)
It would take me over two hours of fiddling around to get things ready when I first started. Nowadays, I have this down to about 30 minutes for one rig, maybe 40 for two. Progress!
Another problem I have is that my property has many large trees, so the slice of sky that I have to work with (basically down the driveway) is very narrow,
Then I see some of my fellow photon herders using observatories. Everything is all set up all the time! Flip and switch and start imaging in minutes. Clear horizons. I WANT THIS. (Envy - you the green-eyed monster you..)
And I will have it - in the next two years, we will be selling our current house and moving - and you guessed it - the new location WILL be suitable for observing - and I WILL build an observatory. But what do I do for NOW?
I decided that something like JMI's Scope Dolly was the solution I was looking for. Unfortunately, JMI shut down for Covid-19 and now has a huge backlog. So that was not going to work for me. Plus, I was not sure I wanted to place my scope permanently on a wheeled rig. I know it has jack screws to provide a solid foundation, but is it more solid than your Tri-Pier sitting on the driveway? I was not at all sure about this.
So I went back to an old Astro enthusiast friend of mine by the name of Rick Albrecht. Those who know Rick know that he is an extremely talented and accomplished Mechanical Engineer with a long track record of building amazing Astro gear. When I first started astronomy many years ago, I had the great fortune of meeting Rick and viewing the night sky in a domed observatory that he designed and built. It housed a massive 16" diameter fork-mounted Newtonian. He ground the mirror and built the mount itself. He even made the 12" brass RA drive gear himself, even machined the teeth on it. And it all worked perfectly. My joke about Rick is that he started with a pile of sand and some iron ore and used that to build the observatory and scope. This is a skillful guy! So who better to talk to about coming up with a solution for a scope dolly?
I talked to Rick about scope dolly ideas and raised my concern about putting an imaging platform on wheels and three jackscrews. It turns out that for his own use - Rick flipped the script on dollies. He built his own tri-pier and mounted wheels on top of the tri-pier legs. When you want to move it, you flip down the wheels into position such that they push down and lift the scope, and now it can be wheeled about. Then, when you have it where you want it, you raise the wheels completely out of the way, and the pier is solidly resting where you want it. I thought it was brilliant - let the Tri-Per legs do their jobs and get the wheels out of the way. But it was not something I could do since I don't have either a machine shop or a welder or the skills to use either.
The Solution is Proposed
So Rick proposed an interesting concept - what if we built a Scope Lifter and Transporter? - we could build it on a two-wheel hand truck, and you would place it under the IOptron Tri-Pier, strap it in, and then use a jackscrew to lift the entire scope a few inches off the ground so you could move it. He thought we could build mostly from wood (something I could work with) and power it with a powered drill.
I loved the idea of it! I have two scopes - while one is temporarily using a Losmandy tripod, I have an Ioptron Tri-Pier on order, so both will have the same base. Instead of two scope dollies, I could use one lifter to move both scopes. Assuming I could leave the scopes set up in my garage, I could lift them, wheel them out to a magic spot on the driveway, and then gently set them down where I want them. He put front wheels on the lifter so that you could precisely position where you lowered the scope. No more assembly. No more leveling. I would still have to do polar alignment, but this could be done very quickly with an Ipolar camera and pre-positioned driveway markers. This sounded like a great idea to me.
So after a few phone calls, Rick and I picked an 18" wide hand truck with 12" pneumatic tires for the foundation of the lift. Once I got that, I sent Rick all of the key measurements he needed, and soon Rick had a design worked out. Next, I started buying wood and hardware and began the build process - consulting with Rick as I went with emails, photos. Videos and phone calls.
Rick’s Design Sheet
Rick Albrecht wrote this up about the design, and I wanted to share it with you (with his permission) here :
Notice
Before showing you my build I should make a few points to make sure we are all on the same page:
This design was done and is owned by Rick Albrecht and neither he nor I will be sharing dimensions and finer design details at this time.
Neither Rick or I make any claims around this design or approach and its suitability for the intended use.
If you decide to build your own version of this project - you do so at your own risk and assume all liability and risks for your effort and its results.
Now that that’s out of the way, let’s proceed.
The Build…
Below you will find some images showing the build process. Clicking on each image will display a larger version and will so more info about what is going on that point in the build.
The Result
The Telescope Lifter/Transporter worked out better than I could have imagined. I now store the telescopes all assembled and balanced. Then, when I am planning on imaging, I use the Transporter to lift the scope and move it out to the driveway, where I drop the scope on precise markers on my driveway. I then go back and get the other scope and do the same. Physical setup takes about 15 minutes for both. I then wait until it is dark, and I then do the Polar Alignment, and I am ready to go! Pick up at the end of the night is just as convenient!
Thanks Rick!
Again my heart-thanks to my Friend Rick Albrecht - I could not have done this without his generous help, direction, and mechanical design smarts!
You can see some of Rick's Photography (he's done some wonderful bird photography as well as astrophotography) and contact him if you have a mind to at:
