The pier for the telescope was designed to be very solid. Since we have deep frosts in Wisconsin during Winter months, we needed to go below the frost line with a pier that would not suffer from pull up or tilting after many yearly cycles of heat and cold.
This was accomplished by putting in a professional footing below the frost line as shown in the bottom photo. The pier has a base that is larger than the pier over its lenght and thus locks the pier into the dirt filled hole. This gives us a very strong pier which is also independent of the concrete slab that supports the building. Some very slight movement of the building does not effect the pier at all.
Notice that with a professionally done concrete slab, it is very smooth, even and level. It is also pointed with the long sides due North. This was nice because everything in the observatory can be referenced to the walls of the building with assurrance that they will be lined up with the sky as expected.
As can be seen in the bottom left photo, we have put a 4" PVC pipe into the slab to carry wires from one corner of the building to the pier. It turned out that a 4" PVC pipe seemed very large to us. But it turned out that with all of the equipment we have at the pier, the big pipe is large enough but not too large at all.
We have 6 independent power lines 3 USB cables 3 serial cables and several other control cables going through the pipe tunnel. Everything fits well and it "pull" through the tunnel is still fairly easy. Little things, like a big enough pipe, when thought of early on, make life easier later on. It also makes working in the observatory much nicer and more convenient.
Again my motto, is there cannot be too many wires. Wires are good. (G)
The operation of the roof is so smooth that it was soon found that a strong wind from the South would push the roof open. Thus a locking mechanism had to be devised to hold the roof in place when closed.
The building is very weather tight. Doc G was in the building during a hard rain downpour with 35 MPH gusting winds. Not a drop of water got into the building. The acompanying hail was a little noisy however.
The entire buildin is on a concrete slab with a 16 inch pier which is isolated from the slab. The pier rises 20 inches above the slab and goes well down into the ground. Because of the deep frosts in Wisconsin, the pier goes down well below the frost line. The entire structure is very solid.
The final finished building is shown below. It has just been finished and no landscaping has been done at this time. Second below is a photo showing the roof of the building rolled back. The building is made from a cement finished cinder block which very sturdy and solid. The door is a steel with a steel frame. The roof rolls back in about a minute controlled with a unique chain drive. This custom drive is run with two geared motors and is totally remote controlled through the observatory computer.
More detail about the roof mechanism, its design and operation are discussed later in these pages. The observatory is serviced by undergraound cables. Line power is provided through the underground cables and two DSL lines provide communications.
In the two photos above you can see the construction of the walls of the observatory on the concrete slab. This was done professionally to insure that we got an excellent job. The walls are straight and rigid and the whole building gives a feeling of solidity. It has a steel front door and is quite secure as well.
