Telescope Reviews: Good homemade alt az design to use poor places?

I need an alt az design for a small refractor or reflector that works well, is easy to make, and whose design I can pass to others overseas or help them build it with their own local wood. This is an extension of the Uganda project only destined for other places too if anyone remembers those old posts.

After a long time searching for small inexpensive tripods, I found a few oldie wooden ones, but their weight capacity is limited. So, I have moved to look for alt az mount designs that I can assemble with basic/common nuts/bolts, and local wood that can handle at least 80mm refractors and perhaps 102s or up to a 4.5 inch reflector. The tripod becomes less important because in most mission places we go, I can find fence post or a tree stump or a pipe...something that will stand vertical. This is where a good design for a basic alt az arrangement comes in along with some kind of adapter that will fit on a variable vertical base (say up to 6 inches). This design DOES NOT have to look fancy; it does not have to operate as smooth as silk; it just has to work...and work again...and work again. The objective is to build it where we go and give it to the people who will have made it with us. I might have to bring the hardware and rope (if rope is used) but that is it. Then, from whatever local wood they have, we will make it and set the scope in it that we will take and leave with them. The wood might be ply, might not, might be rough cut.....it just has to work and have some sort of common cradle where the refractor will set and either be tied down, set in a compression fit, etc.

IF any of you have simple but elegant designs (ones that work and were easy to make) that might have features you think might be good for this application, then I would be glad to see some things to get some ideas.

I anticipate, unless the miraculous appearance of a cheap retractable tripod that is light and strong shows up, having to come up with a simple design for an alt az head that will fit on a vertical piece of anything in the country of choice is the way we will have to go. It will have to be a design adaptable to rough materials and common hardware that I will try in its first prototype. Then I will refine it and make 6 or so for starters in the next year. I have 3 4.5 inch reflectors and a couple small refractors to work with as the alt az design gets tested.

The only other option I have thought of is makeing precut pieces of wood for the same kind of design and then taking those plus the hardware...this makes the kit compact and light. Then I would assemble it on site, put in the scope, adapt it to whatever vertical piece they have, teach them how to use it and care for it, and leave it with them.

Who is innovative out there? I know there are some tinkerers that are great at this sort of thing. I don't want to invent anything that already works really good and would fit the bill. I will take pictures, designs, comments and ideas, material suggestions, etc. Send me a PM if you wish or answer this thread.

Even in Uganda, where we are taking a kit (we sent it via container with other stuff), such a design would become the children's project so they can make it themselves. When there are 400 or so kids in some of these village schools, it does not take long to wear out one tripod and one scope. Hence, we might even use it in places we have the ability to send a box of things ahead of time. Besides, when kids build something like this, it does things and they own its success.

Roland Beard