Stellafane 2001

by Mies Hora

First Stop: SSP at Shady Pines

I had work on deadline this year and couldn't attend during the week.  Heard that Tuesday and Wednesday nights were decent and the overall weather was better than last year. The satellite showed part clouds, but I figured I'd swing by the site on Friday to look at the telescopes, if nothing else, and hear about the viewing I'd missed. Ultimately, after a so-so night of dewy seeing,a big black cloud front moved in around 1 am and almost all trundled off to bed, including me. A half hour later, I chanced a look outside and saw, lo and behold, an unbroken expanse of Milky Way!

The dew miraculously disappeared, the sky became rock steady and a DARK mag 6.5. I and the 7 or 8 people still up then enjoyed some of the best viewing of the week. You know, all good things come to those who wait. Neatest telescope: I was fortunate to meet Steve Neal, who showed me his suitcase dob, an amazing home-built portable with a Meade 16" mirror.  He flew all the way up from Florida with his 70-pounder to attend the SSP.

Stellafane or Bust

I've heard certain people complain that Stellafane is primitive... mud, dust, endless lines, poor parking, smelly Port-o-Sans and crowds, crowds, crowds. To be endured once but just once. I had never been there... should one even bother? My answer: if you are even remotely interested in enjoying telescopes, building them, or refining your commercial model, then get thee to Stellafane! Celebrating its 75th year, this grand-daddy of telescope making conventions/star parties was, for me, pure unadulterated astro fun.

1-1/2 hours north of Shady Pines, this gathering of approx. 1,000 people in Springfield, VT was decidedly a New England affair: gritty, down to earth, spare and unpretentious. Like a well-worn shoe, the site crawled with campers of all ages and description, many seen wolfing down the Ben & Jerry's being served on site.

There were literally hundreds of optical devices on the top of the mountain.  Telescopes and binos of every description festooned the slopes of Breezy Hill.  It was an astronomical wet dream! Here's what your $25 get's you: 

Nifty Lectures (among many):

• Living legend John "Mr. Dob" Dobson, a self-professed "cosmologist", talked for 45 minutes about why the "Big Bang" theory is a bust. This aging hipster is quite a character and is teaching at Yale this Fall.
• Dr. Peter Chen discussed new technologies for creating super lightweight mirrors for use in space telescopes. He has just won a NASA competition to supply optics for a telescope that will eventually end up on the moon! He displayed a 48" mirror made of carbon-fiber composites and resins that weighed just 13 lbs!. The custom truss for the mirror was 4-feet high and weighed about as much as a 20mm Type 2 Nagler. Imagine a 12" mirror for your next dob that weighs 1 lb. He just recently succeeded in creating a diffraction-limited optic using his technology, a real breakthrough.
• I missed the Sat. morning swap meet... drats.

Some equipment highlights:

• Al Nagler and Bob Strong demo-ed some sexy new items: like the new 3-6 mm planetary zoom ep and a prototype TV 76 apo. About the same size as a Pronto but with 6mm more aperture, this f/6.3 ota, if produced, will give the formidable Tak FS78 real competition. The 76 is more compact and every bit as sharp judging from preliminary viewing (under admittedly mediocre
  skies). This could be the ideal travel scope for those who demand the best. Al, you've got my attention....
• Monster dobs: I stood in line to climb the ladder like any enthusiast would to look through both a 32" and a 36" f/5 Obsession dob. I've always wanted to see what M13 would look like through a Godzilla of glass. Verdict: bright but mushy. Neither scope was properly collimated, so the view was thrilling yet frustrating. I'll take an optimized f/6 12.5" any day over these unwieldy behemoths.
• Stereoscopics: there was a bevy of large aperture binos set up on counter-balanced mounts, something for everyone. My favorites were the 100mm military surplus Chinese pair recently reviewed in S&T, a custom built pair of 125mm Astro-Physics ota's on a massive tripod, and a pair of semi-apo Mayauchi 45-degree 20x 77 mm gems that had change-out 30x ep's and which focused like soft butter. I spent nearly an hour chasing sucker holes and viewing dozens of double stars all over the sky with this medium sized beaut.
• An optician star tested an interesting wire frame 8" newtonian on a home-made EQ mount with a self-made spherical mirror that he push/pulled to a parabola and which was rated at 1/40 wave. Judging by the crisp view of the Lyra Epsilon double-double, it was not an empty boast.
  > A cute 3" newtonian reflector with a clear acrylic tube. Used for educational purposes, the interior of the tube was baffled with black paper when viewing. 
• An 8" reflector made out of 2 x 4's with an ingenious (inane?) tracking device: letting air out of an old tire tube at a prescribed rate to follow the object: bizarre!!!
• The famed 12" turret telescope near the pink Clubhouse wasn't operating that night due to the cloudy weather, but was fun to check out none-the-less.
• 18" apertures seemed to be the favorite, as there were dozens of them of every imaginable construction: dobs, split-rings, equatorials, wood, aluminum, composites....
• And now for something completely different Dept.: A medieval style 20-odd foot long f/66 wooden refractor with a hoist to raise and lower it that looked like a guillotine. The builder drove from San Diego in a 1952 Chevy hearse to display his handiwork! (Looking at his two-tone red/white hearse was more fun than looking through his scope.)

Award Presentation and Raffle:

As Saturday evening fell, the conventioneers assembled outdoors in a natural amphitheater to hear about the telescope building contest award winners. First some lucky raffle devils won about $4,500 worth of brand new TV ep's and some other stuff. You should have heard the groans from the crowd upon realizing that their ticket wasn't the one being called. There was a fairly slick video of the telescope competition winners showing off their scopes and quick award presentations. They even presented an Al Nagler look-alike award. David Levy gave an inspirational talk about why Stellafane is so very special. I couldn't agree more.

Summary

Although the night sky never really sparkled that weekend, the daytime weather was sublime, the food service great (fruit smoothies, fresh corn, eggs over easy, sweet sausage, grilled chicken - yum!), I never waited more than a few minutes for anything, the staff and attendees were generally happy, helpful, friendly and excited to be there, and I got a prime parking spot within 5 minutes of my arrival. Even the port-a-crappers didn't stink! This is one well thought out stargazers event and one you shouldn't miss. I'm already planning my return next year to enter my new dob.

Clear Eyes,
Mies Hora

www.stellafane.com