A fully automated digitally controlled 30-inch telescope.
Abstract
A fully automated 30-inch (75-cm) telescope has been successfully designed and constructed from a military surplus Nike-Ajax radar mount. Novel features include: closed-loop operation between mountain telescope and campus computer 30 km apart via microwave link, a TV-type sensor which is photon shot-noise limited, a special lightweight primary mirror, and a stepping motor drive capable of slewing and settling one degree in one second or a radian in fifteen seconds.
- Publication:
-
Publications of the Astronomical Society of the Pacific
- Pub Date:
- August 1975
- DOI:
- 10.1086/129812
- Bibcode:
- 1975PASP...87..565C
- Keywords:
-
- Computer Techniques;
- Digital Systems;
- Pointing Control Systems;
- Remote Control;
- Telescopes;
- Astronomical Photometry;
- Automatic Control;
- Electric Motors;
- Microwave Transmission;
- Mounting;
- Television Systems;
- Astronomy