Still the more I study this, the more interesting the ideas become.
Anthony Wesley, an Australian, has taken this to an extreme. He has a series of 4 articles on his attempts to cool a 10" Newtonian. Instead of fans, he uses Peltier cooling to rapidly bring the mirror down to close to the outside temperature an achieve thermal equilibrium quickly. Before you dismiss this, you need to read up to article 4 where he gives a link to some pictures he has taken. I certainly wish I could get planetary pictures that detailed. I am setting up a similar system to graph the cooling of my telescopes to see if they can benefit from his ideas. If I am successful, some of the equipment may wind up for sale on this page. Stay tuned....... This type of cooling might also benefit SCTs and other telescopes too.
Size: 80x80x25mm fan
rating: 12 volt DC
12 volt - 37 cu ft/min
9 volt - 27 cu ft/min
6 volt - 19 cu ft/min
| Fan Kit for 6" & 8" Newtonians Size: 60x60x25 mm fan rating: 12 volt, DC 12 volt - 21 cu ft/min 9 volt - 16 cu ft/min 6 volt - 11 cu ft/min |
fan, either 60 or 80 mm
fan guard, 60 or 80 mm
5 feet of elastic rope
double-stick pad for mounting 9 volt clamp (battery not included)
9 volt battery clamp
9 volt connector
SPST toggle switch
Kit works best with soldered connections from the battery
connector and fan to the
toggle switch, so some soldering is needed.
60 mm fan with guard suspended behind 6" mirror 60 mm fan with guard suspended behind 8" mirror
I like my batteries on the outside as they are easy to change without disturbing the mirror area. Where you mount them is up to you.
I run my elastic up from the fan out and around 1/4 of the tube and back in to suspend the fan (twice to provide tension to all 4 corners. The black elastic can be seen in the photo below on the outside of the tube, and in the photo below and to the left inside. It is threaded through the screwholes in the fan & fan guard and a knot tied to hold it there.
fan, either 60 or 80 mm
fan guard, 60 or 80 mm
5 feet of elastic rope
double-stick pad for mounting 6 volt battery pack (battery not included)
6 volt battery pack
SPST toggle switch
Kit works best with soldered connections from the battery
connector and fan to the
toggle switch, so some soldering is needed.
80mm fan with guard behind 8" mirror 80mm fan with guard behind 10" mirror
Elastic cords hold the fan in place and decouple any vibration from the fan. The fans are quite smooth running, but this is recommended in the articles linked above and it works well.