Re: ATM 10in. Mirror

["John A. Volk" <103037.3107@compuserve.com>]

James,

My first mirror was a 10"f/6 and it came out very nicely - I used it last 
weekend at over 300x on Jupiter.  It was done under the guidance of John 
Dobson plus some of my own initiative. Basically I continued figuring after 
John 'passed' it.  I estimate 20 to 30 hours effort.  I can in no way conceive
of why people spend hundreds of hours on mirrors this size and smaller unless 
they do not have good instruction and/or, as John Dobson says 'don't have the 
computer turned on' i.e. are not thinking about what they are doing learning 
and from their mistakes.  If you can get some expert help I would go for a 
10".  The main problem I noticed with those making larger mirrors was that the
physical effort gets exponentially higher with size for manual grinding & 
polishing.  A 12.5" takes a lot of muscle.  BTW I figured with the star test 
method.  Good Luck!

Go For the 10, It is Worth the View !!!

John A. Volk