As I mentioned in the Unitron History Project thread it is my great honor and privilege to have the opportunity to be a part of the next chapter in the history of a relatively rare and unique 5” f/16 Unitron 510. In the interest of not hijacking the Unitron History Project thread we thought that it would be a good idea to start a thread as a place to tuck away notes on this wonderful telescope.
To begin, much of the history of this telescope, and a Unitron 530, has been well documented on the Unitron History Project website;
http://www.unitronhistory.com/
..and links therein. The Unitron History Project Website is an amazing resource and well worth taking the time to explore, so there’s no need to repeat any of its content here.
A couple of side notes that I found while researching this particular 510 includes a couple of threads here on Cloudy Nights. For example, this thread by long-time owner Jim Craft (highertheflyer) that describes some of the telescope’s early history and his thoughts on its future…
https://www.cloudyni...ield-telescope/
...and a thread on when the scope was handed off to Tom Terleski (Turk) and the very beginnings of what was to become an amazing restoration project...
https://www.cloudyni...ion-1300-miles/
...and an early project that Tom executed to build a new set of legs for the 510’s tripod…
https://www.cloudyni...d-construction/
The full restoration is described on the Unitron History Project website with a link to the full thread here on Cloudy Nights (that I frequently turn to for information).
And I think that brings us up to date! As I mentioned above, I am blessed to have an opportunity to be a part of the Next Chapter in this scope’s journey. The Plan is to use this scope in a mix of personal and outreach and a mix of using it on its original mount and on a modern mount. If appropriate it may also see service as an imaging platform (and I have done with my 155). I hope to use this thread to chronicle the progress of this journey. Given the nature of threads, I would encourage others to share their experiences with similar modest/large classics, and we’ll see where it goes!
So, in the beginning…
After a long and thoroughly enjoyable conversation with Dave (Combatdad) we made arrangements for Dave to drop off the scope during a visit with family here in Dayton, Ohio. It was wonderful meeting Dave and his brother in-law and it was amazing finally seeing the scope and the cabinets first-hand. (BTW, Dave looks just like his pictures and is the nicest person that you could ever meet.) Step #1 was going through all of the parts and pieces and assembling the basic scope to get an introduction to the task at hand. Having prior experience with a 155c was a big help and assembling the basic scope was fairly straight forward. A big difference was that the equatorial head was far too heavy to even think about lifting onto the tripod. As Dave suggested, the best procedure is to mate the head to the tripod while lying on the ground, and then to lift the assembly up onto the tripod’s feet. The rest of the assembly is typical Unitron; add the counterweight shaft, weights, tube, slow motion rods/cable, Uni-balance, diagonal, eyepiece. (Details to follow.)
This first night out was primarily just an introduction to the scope. The sky was veiled with a thick layer of of smoke, but I was still able to sneak a peek at a few targets.
First observation; as reported in the history of this scope one of the early owners shortened the tripod legs by removing the spikes, supposedly so that it would fit under a garage door. I kinda liked the spikes as they do a great job of anchoring the tripod to the turf and I thought about adding at least booties to the ends of the legs. Dave provided a set of spare legs that were originally designed to convert a 530 pedestal mounted 5” to a tripod mounted field scope. However, after using the scope it is plenty high enough! If it were much higher reaching the eyepiece at even modest altitudes could be a problem. So, for now, if it t’ain’t broke, don’t fix it.
Second observation; also as reported the drive motor was a tad noisy and ran warm/hot. More on this later. However, the tracking rate was spot-on, and it ran for several hours using the 120vac output from my LiOH battery using about 50% of the initial charge.
Third observation; the image quality was amazing. Turk did an great job of collimating the scope and it has held alignment. Using a Meade 5.5mmUWA eyepiece (364x) stars showed sharp Airy disks with sharp, tight, concentric Airy disks. Venus showed a sharp crescent phase, a beautiful soft terminator, and a hint of detail. The moon looked amazing with no hint of image breakdown. I dropped back to 227x (Meade 8.8mm UWA) for epsilon Lyra and the Double Double was amazing with a clean split for both components. I could have stared at it all night, but I had to go to work the next day, so this was enough for the first night.
Fourth observation; in typical Unitron fashion everything was well designed, assembly was clear and self-explanatory with excellent ergonomics, and the scope was very comfortable to use. One thing that I have always enjoyed about the classics from this era is that they were designed for manual operation, and everything is exactly where your hands expect to find them in the dark. I also like how the slow motion controls have different knobs so that you can tell which control is which in the dark.
So, off to a great start!
Let the Adventure Begin!
The Unitron 510 after the initial check-out assembly waiting for first-light...
Edited by jgraham, 08 July 2023 - 09:02 PM.