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jackk
member
Reged: 10/14/08
Posts: 58
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Hello all, I was wondering if anyone had any advice and/or experience building a small observatory in an urban location?
(why even bother build an observatory in an urban location you ask? well, i live here and you would be amazed what you can image nowadays under a heavily light polluted sky)
We have a pretty smallish backyard (big for city standards, tiny for suburban standards), streetlights in the alley, and a tall tree to the south and a tallish tree to the north. It is probably one of the worst places on the planet for astronomy.  Im just trying to make it a tad more convenient for setup. I would love to just set up with a scopebuggy, but our garage faces an alley, not a driveway.
Any ideas? Anyone else in an urban location? Or am i just crazy?
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Siderea
Astronomess
Reged: 11/21/05
Posts: 2111
Loc: Left Coast
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Hi Jack
I live in the North West corner of the San Francisco bay area, much lightwash to the east and southeast, better skies directly south and west.
Ace Hardware Observatory in a box
This was my solution to observing from our second floor balcony, a good view from 30 degrees up from the southern horizon to 20 degrees past zenith along the meridian.
The shades work well to block out the neighbors light,s but this blind has proven invaluable for quick setup with my 60mm scopes. Its dark, comfortable, extremely light weight, and even has a cupholder, and pockets for atlas and extra eyepieces. I use a couple of clothespins to raise the window for viewing higher up.
Any time , no matter what the light polution, spent under the stars is all good!
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lc Carol
"
She generally gave herself very good advice, (though she very seldom followed it). ." — Lewis Carroll
60mm Telescope Club
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1965healey
Post Laureate
Reged: 06/23/07
Posts: 3237
Loc: San Antonio, TX
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Hello Jack and welcome to the obs forum! There are quite a few of us who live in urban areas and have built different types of observatories. Marcus has JAT a dome in an urban setting, John Crilly has his Urban Observatory , a roll off, roof-top observatory in an urban setting and I have Woodlawn Lake Observatory a roof top roll-off located about 3 miles from downtown San Antonio, TX. All of us have played the hand that light pollution has dealt us and are pretty happy with our observatories. It can be done. Check out the links to get some ideas and again welcome to the obs forum!
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1965Healey (Karen)
Woodlawn Lake Observatory
Celestron CPC 800/FT MIcro/APT Wedge
SV NHNG 80mm #0261/CG5-GT
Celestron Omni 150 XLT
Losmandy rails/rings
Starizona CWeight system
Sony a100 DSLR/Mod Canon 40D
Meade DS60's w/Autostar (2)
Meade LPI/Meade DSI-C/DSI ProII
750cc Honda Shadow Spirit (Thanks Dad!)
1965 Austin Healey 3000 MKIII
1975 ODay Daysailer II
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andyschlei
sage
Reged: 03/05/06
Posts: 412
Loc: Los Angeles, CA
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My observatory is 5 miles north of the runways at Los Angeles International. So I know about light pollution. I also have a small backyard (40' wide in the back of a 110' lot).
We built a 9x7 roll-off when we rebuilt the garage. It's small but works well.
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Observatorio de la Ballona
Mar Vista
Lake Riverside Estates
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Starman27
professor emeritus
Reged: 01/29/06
Posts: 706
Loc: Illinois, Iowa
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Try the "Thinking Outside" Shed. I used one before I replaced it with a POD. Go to MAPUG and look up shed observatories.
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Enjoy the dark,
Herman
Meade
14 LX200 GPS SMT
12 LX200 GPS
7 LX200 Maksutov
ETX 125
TAK FS128 NSV
Sky 90II
Lunt LS60ThaDS BF1200
Canon 5D Mark II
Illinois
Iowa
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Chris Schroeder
Postmaster
Reged: 12/11/04
Posts: 6783
Loc: N.E. WI Sky Glow
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I live on the edge of a white zone with Mag 3.5-4 skies. Before I bought the POD, I used a plastic garden shed for storage and light panels to block the wind and light. For quick peeks I still do visual but for longer sessions, I use my Mallincam for video Astronomy.
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Chris
Mallincam Color Hyper Plus
10" DSH with SC DSC, CPC 800 XLT
M110 Doublet ED, AT 102Achro, ZS80FD 10th Anniv, ZS66SD, PST
CG5-AGT, EZ-Touch, Voyager
POD XL3 http://POD.SchroederCity.com
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soreneck
scholastic sledgehammer
Reged: 04/01/06
Posts: 953
Loc: Toronto, Canada
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Quote:
We have a pretty smallish backyard (big for city standards, tiny for suburban standards), streetlights in the alley, and a tall tree to the south and a tallish tree to the north. It is probably one of the worst places on the planet for astronomy.
Any ideas? Anyone else in an urban location? Or am i just crazy?
You're not crazy! In fact, I think you've described my own urban-backyard-alley-trees location.
Last summer I built a small (8x8) roll-off roof observatory (my build thread with pictures can be found here).
As many wise backyard astronomers have told me, the best observatory (and telescope) is the one you use most often! For this reason alone I chose to build in a less-than-ideal location that I can use every clear night, rather than a perfect dark-sky location far from home that I'd be lucky to use 10X per year. No regrets so far.
Good luck and be sure to keep us posted!
Adam
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Adam
TMB 130SS / WO 66 Triplet
QHY9 for sale (PM me if interested)
STL-11000M (new to me!)
Modified Canon 450D
SkyWatcher EQ-6 Pro
Urban backyard roll-off observatory
One small but fearless dog (observing companion)
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quantumac
sage
Reged: 12/17/07
Posts: 484
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Got my roll-off observatory in my back yard, smack dab in Central Texas, home to all kinds of "enviro-weenie" light pollution. Seems the environmentalist Austin city council is so "green" they think the sky should also be green (and sometimes orange). So yeah, light pollution makes deep sky imaging a challenge here, but I figure it's far better to have an observatory close by that I routinely use rather than one far away that I rarely use.
Now if I were really serious, like fellow Central Texas resident Russell Croman (http://www.rc-astro.com/), I'd build a fully automated observatory in New Mexico, and control it via the internet. I have a feeling most of us who build observatories ARE that serious, we just have less understanding wives and/or monetary support. 
Speaking of monetary support, anybody seen my 401K? I think it ran off with an investment banker and a congressman on a "fact-finding" trip to Aruba.
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Scope: Meade 10" LX200R
Guide/Planetary Camera: Imaging Source DBK41AF02.AS
DSO Camera: QHY8
Guide Hardware: Celestron OAG, Shoestring Astronomy GPUSB
Software: Mac OS X, Starry Night Pro, Nebulosity, PHD Guiding, PixInsight, Astro IIDC. No Windows anything.
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SleepIsWrong
professor emeritus
Reged: 12/07/05
Posts: 523
Loc: Baltimore, MD
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Echoing what others have already said in this thread. My observatory (in my back yard) is about 4 miles N of the center of downtown Baltimore. I observe over 100 nights a year. I used to have an observatory under reasonably dark skies in western MD - right at the edge of the mountains. It was a 75-minute drive each way. Place got used about 20 times in two years. I loose a mangitude or two because of the bright sky, depending on what sort of data I'm taking. Using a spectrograph I'm not loosing much at all since readout noise tends to dominate over sky noise except for very long exposures. Photometry is a little different story - though again, for short exposures, the camrea readout noise is often larger than the sky noise. I'd WAY prefer to be under dark skies but things is what they is. I pick my battles - and go to star parties when I can!
Mike
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14" Celestron CGE (two of 'em)
Soupy, orange, mag 4. skies (woof!)
ST9-XE, ST8-XME
ssp-3 photometer
Mira Pro UE7 & ProScript, IDL v7.1, AIP4Win, MaxIm DL, TheSky6 Pro, PC-IRAF 2.14.1
Way too many white squares in the graphic, below
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jackk
member
Reged: 10/14/08
Posts: 58
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Thanks everyone for the great recommendations! I was thinking about cutting a hole in my roof or my garage, but I was worried that the heat rising off the black roof at night (especially in the summer) would create terrible "seeing" conditions. Have others found this to be the case?
If i do build this on my roof, i dont know how i would create a concrete pier. Is it very stable to do away with the concrete pier and simply attach the pier to some reinforced floor boards?
Im checking out the POD, looks great. Looks like to be the best option for an "lawn-based" observatory.
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jrcrilly
Refractor wienie no more
Reged: 04/30/03
Posts: 25836
Loc: NE Ohio
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Quote:
If i do build this on my roof, i dont know how i would create a concrete pier. Is it very stable to do away with the concrete pier and simply attach the pier to some reinforced floor boards?
No.
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John C
Urban Observatory
A&M/Astreya 76mm F/6 APO
Meade 80mm F/6 APO
TMB/LOMO 80mm F/7.5 APO
Meade 152ED, 178ED F/9 "APO"
Meade 12" SCT
Teeter 20" F/3.8 truss Newt w/ServoCat
NJP, LXD700, CGE, GPDX/SS2KPC
ST-10XME, DSI Pro
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tim53
Carpal Tunnel
Reged: 12/17/04
Posts: 2263
Loc: Highland Park, CA
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Jack:
I built Hatch Observatory into my 1887 Victorian roof. The scope is mounted to the 2x12 roof joists. I do get vibration when it's windy (but did with the scope on the tripod and wedge in the field when it was windy, too) and when my son runs up and down the stairs below, but when it's calm, I've used it for DSO imaging. And I live 7 miles north of downtown Los Angeles.
Mostly, I do planetary imaging with it, though, so vibration is seldom a problem, unless my son's running up or down the stairs! But I don't process those videos! ;oD
-Tim.
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"In the old days, before the discovery of eruptions, the lava had to be carried by hand down the mountain and thrown on the sleeping villagers. This took a lot of time." - New Yorker Cartoon, ~ 1980
Hatch Observatory details:
http://www.cloudynights.com/ubbthreads/showflat.php?Cat=0&Number=3593949&page=0&view=collapsed&sb=5&o=all&fpart=1&vc=&PHPSESSID=
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nytecam
Postmaster
Reged: 08/20/05
Posts: 5978
Loc: London UK
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Go for it and good luck See my avatar - I'm in London with a pop of 8M and this is what I can do with my smallest scope - more stuff via link below 
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Nytecam 51N 0.1W
Meade 30cm LX200+ETX-70+e-finder+C8+Ha+CaK PSTs SBIG SGS+homebuilt spectrographs
Starlight SXVF_M9+Lodestar CCDs/Canon 300D DSLR/Hitachi HD+Disgo Video Fun cams
My observatory build-ETX-70 imaging-my videos
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jackk
member
Reged: 10/14/08
Posts: 58
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Quote:
Jack:
I built Hatch Observatory into my 1887 Victorian roof. The scope is mounted to the 2x12 roof joists. I do get vibration when it's windy (but did with the scope on the tripod and wedge in the field when it was windy, too) and when my son runs up and down the stairs below, but when it's calm, I've used it for DSO imaging. And I live 7 miles north of downtown Los Angeles.
Mostly, I do planetary imaging with it, though, so vibration is seldom a problem, unless my son's running up or down the stairs! But I don't process those videos! ;oD
-Tim.
This is really cool! I love that.
Actually, I think i kind of solved the problem. Im going to build the roll off roof on top of our detached garage. I can extend the concrete pier down to the floor of the garage. Hopefully my wife wont drive into the pier ever.
I will prolly need to get some sort of architect to design this? Is that what people usually do? And then get some contractor to build it? I assume the housing contractors have lots of free time nowadays.
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1965healey
Post Laureate
Reged: 06/23/07
Posts: 3237
Loc: San Antonio, TX
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Hey Jack, mine was designed right here on CN with plenty of input from the members and the building expertise of Scott Horstman @ Backyard Observatories. The final design was completed on a scrap of paper on top of the freezer in my garage about 10 minutes before we started demolition. I got a set of plans from Scott in case I needed to pull a permit but since we kept the obs under 1000 sq. ft. we didn't need them. The pier for my scope is exactly what you propose. I would recommend Scott Horstman as mine is one of over 100 that he's designed and built. Backyard Observatories
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1965Healey (Karen)
Woodlawn Lake Observatory
Celestron CPC 800/FT MIcro/APT Wedge
SV NHNG 80mm #0261/CG5-GT
Celestron Omni 150 XLT
Losmandy rails/rings
Starizona CWeight system
Sony a100 DSLR/Mod Canon 40D
Meade DS60's w/Autostar (2)
Meade LPI/Meade DSI-C/DSI ProII
750cc Honda Shadow Spirit (Thanks Dad!)
1965 Austin Healey 3000 MKIII
1975 ODay Daysailer II
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