This is a 1976 photo of my friend, Master Machinist Bill Loumaster, and the telescope he designed and built. Bill discovered he got more enjoyment making it than using it and so he sold it to me around 1975 or 1976. The optics, a 12.5" f15 Dall-Kirkham, were purchased from Coulter around 1974. Except for the optics, the design is his and he made everything himself, including the drive gears. The telescope tube was made from rolling fiberglass cloth and resin to a wall thickness of 3/16th of an inch. Bill won a Unique Design award at the 1983 Riverside Telescope Maker’s Conference.
This is the telescope before I replaced the finder and beefed up the fork arms. It was mounted in my permanent observatory for about 15 years, after I made the changes described below, before I got my current 16" Meade LX200R Telescope. The Dall-Kirkham was great for general observing when it was portable, but the drive system is not adequate for serious work like photometry. Both axis are driven by DC motors from small hand held tape recorders. This drive system does not give me the flexibility and movement control I need for more serious work.
