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2012 Cave Astrola Telescope Restoration Introduced during the middle of the twentieth century, the Cave Astrola Telescope became all the rage for amateur astronomers and deep sky object enthusiasts during the 1960’s and 70’s. The Cave Optical Company that was in charge of this minor scientific revolution was led by a father and son team. Thomas R. Cave, with help from his father, founded this company and began producing telescope mirrors, telescopes complete with mountings, and other Astrola accessories in 1950. The company fluctuated greatly over nearly two decades, and ended up closing down in 1979; but not after producing over 80,000 optical mirrors and 16,000 whole telescopes, and making its mark on history. After the closing of his company, Cave (Jr.) began working and producing mirrors for NASA on various occasions; and is well known for producing the largest mirror in use at NASA still today. Cave was honored with many awards in his lifetime, including the Bruce Blair medal of the Western Amateur Astronomers and the Walter Haas Award. Even today, astronomers revere the Cave Astrola Telescope that was introduced by the Cave family. Even without computerized power, the Astrola is extremely clear and focused, which allowed for the most optimal sky viewing of its time. This 20th century creation allowed for many technological advances in astronomy, the telescope itself not being in the least of them. The makeup of an Astrola consists of one main scope, two to three finder scopes, a mirror, individual focusers with varying sizes, and lots of miscellaneous parts. Restoring a Cave Astrola Telescope takes a lot of patience, knowledge, and hard work. Obviously, this first depends on the condition the telescope is in after these many years. The Sheridan College Astrola is in fairly decent condition, seeing as though it has been worked on over the years by multiple astronomy classes and has been kept in a dry, warm place. Dust, wiring, mounting and realigning are the main challenges here. The Fall 2012 class team found that the wiring is seemingly destroyed (whether by time, people, or other circumstance is hard to determine.) Therefore, it was decided that the project will mainly focus on the other three challenges. First, cleaning the mirror was a task in itself. Heavy and susceptible to fingerprints and dust, the mirror must be cleaned well with water, soap, and special lens cleaning paper. Many handlers make the mistake of using household cleaners or cloth towels to clean the surface. This could leave threads or scratches and could permanently damage the mirror's surface. After the mirror is cleaned, it will have to be placed in the telescope without being touched on the mirror face itself. Once this is complete, the next step can commence. Second, deciding whether or not to create a mount (pedestal) for the telescope is an issue. If the Astrola was to ever be usable again, especially because of its size and weight, it must be on an adjustable pedestal that can be moved in altitude and elevation for precise polar alignment. However, this feat would take welding skills and time. Presenting a blueprint to the welding shop at Sheridan College is seemingly the only way to complete this, and time is not on our side. A pedestal, although necessary and beneficial, will probably not be in the reasonable future for this semester. The third and arguably most important task would be that of aligning the telescope. With the help of the Backyard Astronomer's Guide, we first had to determine how to collimate the telescope. The secondary mirror was first to be aligned and centered in the focuser. My partner tightened and loosened the screws on the end of the telescope that allowed for movement in the mirror; meanwhile I looked through the eyepiece and tried to determine if she was turning the right or wrong way. The difficulty with this was that she was turning and I was trying to give directions; neither of us had the same left or right. It would be easier to do as one person, albeit impossible due to the size of this telescope. After adjusting the secondary mirror, we then adjusted the spider vanes accordingly. (The spider vanes are used during collimation and are used to control movement of the secondary mirror in collaboration with the tilt screws.) The primary mirror must then be adjusted in much the same way. One way to know for certain that the telescope's mirrors are aligned is to place a small (black or white depending on the light of the area you are working in) dot in the center of the primary mirror before it is placed in the back of the 'scope. When aligning the telescope, note the small dot and use it to coordinate the exact center. A light shining in the opposite end of the telescope proved to be helpful. After the above is complete, the telescope should be in decent alignment. Star testing is the ideal way to assume the alignment is correct. Without the mount and pedestal available for the Cave Astrola, our group had to use a “fake” star point created by a pinhole of incandescent light similar to that of a natural star’s light angle. This we performed by setting up that light at the end of the hall, and attempting to adjust the height, angle and positions right to left of the telescope at the opposite end. This proved difficult due to the manual lifting and positioning of the Astrola on the floor. In the end, we succeeded with a decent visual of the mirrors aligned and the picture clear. Thomas Cave and his father made their mark in scientific history by creating this telescope. My partner and I tried to make our mark on the Sheridan College Astronomy program by attempting to restore a 1960's Cave Astrola Telescope. While we may or may not completely finish this scientific feat this semester, we have learned so much about astronomy, Cave Astrola Telescopes, and mechanics that it made the experience all worth it.