Re: ATM Restoring an old Coude refractor

[Assaf Berwald <meshoamam@yahoo.com>]

Hello all,
Thanks again for all the replies, they're all very
helpful.  I, however, am now pretty scared: I took the
objective assembly out of the tube today and cleaned
the two exposed sides, both came out pretty clean. The
fungus (?) seems to be between the lenses (as Bob
suggested, they probably fed very well inside there
<G>). But I began wondering: the disturbance of the
fungus is fairly small in terms of surface of the lens
( about a dozen or so of 1-2 mm's brown dots with
additional 2-3 mm's of what looks like an oil stain
sorrounding each dot). My intention now is to leave
the lens assy intact and see how bad (if at all) an
image apears through the scope. If I notice severe
deterioration in contrast I will re-consider
opening&cleaning the lenses).
After all, Im not a "real" ATMer since I never build a
telescope (yet). I only repair and (try to) modify
excisting scopes, mainly in our observatory. I never
dealt with a refractor before but only SCT's and
reflectors and Im wouldnt want to give my first shot
at a scope of this level.
The two mirrors inside the mount seems to be as new.
Hopefully I will have a steel pier for this scope this
week or the next one so I can take it out to see first
light after about 17 years or so...will of course keep
you all updated with anything new that I find.
Id like to thanks again for the help I recieved from
so many members of this list,
Assaf B.



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