BACHES A Compact Light-Weight Echelle Spectrograph for Amateur Astronomy

BACHES is a low-cost, light-weight echelle spectrograph suitable for observations of bright stars coupled with small telescopes up to 35 cm (14?) in diameter. The resolving power reaches 19000 in a continuous spectral range between 390 and 750 nm. The throughput of the instrument including the telescope and detector is 11% peak at 500 nm. With this efficiency spectra of stars of visual magnitude 5 can be obtained in 15 min exposure with a S/N of 50. One of the goals of the instrument is to monitor the spectral variability of Balmer emission lines in Be stars.