Equipment

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The permanently mounted scope is a Meade 12" LX200 f/10 Schmidt-Cassegrain telescope (SCT) with super wedge. A 90mm f/5.6 rich-field refractor (not shown) is mounted on the 12" primarily for CCD auto guiding using a Meade Pictor 201XT CCD Autoguider.

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Mounting  Pier Construction

The LX200 is linked to a PC running Starry Night Deluxe and Astronomers Control Panel software. This setup allows full control over the scope and the ability to add new objects, for example comet C/1999 S4 Linear.

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35mm photography is done with an Olympus OM1 fitted with a Varimagni viewer and Olympus 1-8 astrophotography focusing screen.  This camera is perhaps the finest emulsion camera available for astrophotography.  The OM1 is fully manual, mechanical as well as light weight, and has a "mirror lockup" mode (lessens the chance of vibration).

The small orange tube is a Celestron C8 8" SCT , with its big brother, a vintage C14 14" SCT (owned by the University of New Brunswick).

The small blue scope on the floor is a 4" Maksutov-Cassegrain manufactured in the mid to late seventies by the now defunct Optical Techniques Inc Company (OTI). This American made scope was marketed against the Questar 3.5", using optics produced by the same manufacturer as the Questar. The scopes optical and construction quality is extremely good. OTI was unable to brake Questars' hold on the market and went out of business in the early eighties.

A second PC is used to run two homemade CCD cameras.