Building an ultra-portable Dobsonian

I LIVE IN A FOREST. The only view of the sky I get from my house is a tiny notch above my roof, viewable from my driveway. To make matters worse, my sky is badly light polluted. So every telescope I’ve made has to fit into my car for the drive out of town and be at least tolerably easy to set up and take down in the dark.

I also dream of travelling to distant places see parts of the sky inaccessible from my home. Somehow, I don’t think I’ll be taking my 32-cm binocular scope on an aeroplane, though. Nor do I trust baggage handlers with a classic Dobsonian or even a refractor in a padded case. What I need is a scope with enough aperture to be useful that packs into a box I can carry onboard.

A seed is planted

Years ago I came across an amazing travelscope built by Dutch telescope maker Roel Weijenberg. It sported a 20-cm f/4 mirror yet fit into a box only 24 x 27 x 10 cm on a side — a box made up of the scope’s own ground board and rocker box. The moment I saw it I knew I wanted to build one myself, but