[ATM] "Render Unto Ceasar. . . . "

[artbianconi@blast.net]

After almost three decades of designing and making things for 
others, frequently with composites, you get intuitive finding 
solutions and comfortable with the material. 

I allowed this comfort to delude me into thinking that because 
OTA design and fabrication is relatively benign, that I should 
make a mirror too. That way I could proudly say: " I did it all 
myself". At my age, you'd think I'd know better than to get 
suckered into something by my ego! 

Another reason I should have stayed away from mirror making 
was my oft demonstrated bewilderment at understanding the 
process. It's not the idea of generating surfaces accurate to 
angstroms that bothered me so much as the magical, mystery 
tour of translating surface abberations into something parabolic 
with movements that appear to be created by tribal shamans 
from the interior of the Dark Continent. 

Well folks, this man is eating crow! I have no desire to build lots 
of mirrors; just one. It's become painfully apparent that the 
amount of time needed to climb the learning curve to build just 
one good mirror is considerable and more than I care to spend.

If the time I spend building polishing tables, making Faoucoult 
testers, constructing mirror benches, pouring dental tools, 
heating pitch, grooving and pressing laps and the arduous 
testing and figuring were applied elsewhere, not only would the 
ink in my bank statement be blacker but I'd have my telescope 
built too.

To invest so much time into making just making one mirror is not 
wise, especially for one such as me who has such varied 
interests, responsibilities and commitments. 

I've learned a lot and met some wonderful people along the way, 
so the investment thus far is not without value. It's best, however, 
that I acknowledge my limitations and do what I do best: cut 
carbon and glass plies and mix resin.

Last night I did just that and it was enormous fun: I took a roll of 
corrigated card board, saturated it with resin, rolled it into a tube 
and set it aside to cure. This morning I awoke to the lightest, 
strongest, cheapest telescope tube, I'd ever held! The flutes are 
on the outside. I can either repeat the process with the flutes 
inside or simply wrap it with a sheet of heavy craft paper, 
saturated in resin. 

It wasn't my idea. Molt taylor died about ten years ago. An 
innovative airplane designer, he made, among other things, a 
170 mile-per-hour airplane using that technique. A single place, 
PAPER AIRPLANE that gets almost 3 miles per hour per 
horsepower and sips fuel at the absurdly low rate of 4 gallons per 
hour!

Taylor was not alone in innovating. Burt Rutan built structural 
panels using foam, resin and bed sheets! They turned out to be 
stronger, lighter and less expensive than the construction 
method used on a popular airplane design of that period.

If someone had told me that to tell the time, I'd have to learn 
watch making, and I had no passion for watch making, the right 
choice would have been obvious. It's taken longer than it should 
have to discover that mirror making is less science, and more art 
form and that I love astronomy more than polishing glass.

Thanks for all the support 

Art Bianconi

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