3D Printed Telescope Concept

This is my 3D printed telescope design that I will be working on over the next year or so. The concept came about after seeing a 3D printed axial flux generator (https://www.thingiverse.com/thing:885044 ) and it reminded me of the axial flux motors used by PlaneWave Instruments on the CDK700 telescope and mount observatory system. I wanted to push my Dremel Idea Builder 3D printer as far as it could go and see if I could come up with a telescope and mount with a direct drive motor with goto capabilities. Around mid September I started designing this system around a 9.75” salvaged parabolic mirror. The mirror will be reground to a much shorter focal ratio of f/3 to make the optical tube assembly (OTA) much shorter. This design could also be adapted to different mirror sizes or a different optical design, like a Schmidt Cassegrain. Using TinkerCad I have taken and edited the original stator and rotor, incorporating them into the OTA and fork mount. This design also calls for multiple pieces of OpenBeam (http://www.openbeamusa.com ) extruded aluminum as the main structure of the OTA and mount.

I am going to use this blog to make weekly posts to document this project in as much detail as possible and to hopefully get some feedback on possible improvements or solutions to design issues. All of the design files will be available on httpp://www.thingiverse.com/thing:1112195. Most of the OTA and mount have been designed at this point and I am currently printing out parts and test fitting them one by one. I hope to have a complete bill of materials (BOM) in a future post as the physical design is finalized.

There are a few outstanding issues I'm currently working through and might take some time to find solutions to. First is the absolute encoders needed for pointing and tracking. I am going to try and use inductive sensing via the TI LDC1614 and I will go into more detail about this later (http://www.ti.com/product/ldc1614). Second is the electronics needed to drive the motors and run the goto/tracking of the mount. And last is the large base of the mount that must be printed in pieces due to the small print volume of my Dremel 3D printer. Also, the motor and encoder must be placed next to each other increasing the complexity of the print even more.