Upgrades and Accessories Available for Teeter's Telescopes

Electronic Accessories

Under-Primary Cooling Fan

After our industry-exclusive Dual Boundary Layer Cooling Fans (DBLCFs) have done their job of scrubbing the boundary layer and have cooled the interior of your mirrorbox to ambient temperature, our new Under-Primary Cooling Fan can be utilitzed. Once the primary is at ambient temperature you want to keep it there by gently pushing a cool stream of air from behind it. That's what our Under-Primary Cooling Fan is designed to do, keep your primary mirror cool but not disrupt high-power planetary observing with vibration or excessive air flow.

Each fan comes mounted on a Baltic Birch fan-board, stained to match the rest of your scope, and also includes a brass grill guard, Sorbothane vibration suppression gaskets and is red-LED switched for easy On/Off access.

Astrosystems DewGuard Secondary Heater

$62.00 - $72.00, Dependent Upon Secondary Mirror Minor Axis Dimension.

A necessity in areas prone to dewy conditions and scopes with secondary mirrors 1.52" Minor Axis and larger to ensure dew doesn't settle on the optical surface of the secondary mirror and shut down your observing session. 12-volt Power is brought across one of the spider vanes using ultra-thin flat wire for a minimal increase in diffraction. The wiring terminates with a female 1/8" mono-plug RCA jack on the Upper Tube Assembly (UTA) of the scope. A simple male-to-male 1/8" mono-plug RCA cable is then run between the UTA of the scope down to the Kendrick Astro Instruments' DigiFire-7 control box mounted on the mirrorbox of the scope.

Some observers prefer mounting their SkyCommander, ArgoNavis or other Digital Setting Circle (DSC) box on the Upper Tube Assembly (UTA) of their Truss-Dob. However, some feel that the SkyCommander, for example, is too bright (even on the lowest brightness setting) to be that close to the eyepiece and others don't want the extra weight on the UTA and the necessary counter-balance weight on the mirrorbox. The solution? Mounting the DSC box on the mirrorbox at the balance-point of the scope.

By utilizing a Ball & Socket joint, our DSC Bracket swivels, tilts flat and can be removed entirely for transport by turning the single, large, side-mounted thumbscrew (no tools necessary!). When titled flat, the bracket will not protrude from the mirrorbox any further than the adjacent brass handle. For added security, the bracket can be completely removed, leaving behind the mounting base, which also protrudes no more than the adjacent brass handle.

Hook & Loop is employed for mounting your DSC box to the DSC Bracket. Constructed of machined and anodized aluminum, and mounted using brass hardware to match the rest of your scope, this bracket is a novel and ergonomic addition to any scope utilizing DSCs.

SkyCommander (or equivalent) DSC Hardware Kit and Installation

Includes mounting hardware, encoder tangent arms and installation of altitude and azimuth encoders. If you already have a SkyCommander unit, you will want to order this kit, or if you are ordering the SkyCommander unit above you will need to add this to your order.

Single and Dual Rechargeable Battery Packages

Optical Upgrades

1/30 P-V Antares Optics Secondary Mirrors

$30.00 - $100.00, Dependent Upon Secondary Mirror Minor Axis Dimension.

All Teeter's Telescopes come standard with Antares Optics 1/20 P-V Secondary Mirrors with 96% enhanced aluminum coating and an SiO overcoat for protection. Such mirrors are well matched to most of the primary mirrors we install in our Ultra-Limited-Edition Truss-Dobsonians.

However, some primary mirrors do come in testing above 1/20 P-V, therefore in those instances the secondary mirror would become the "bottleneck" or the "weakest link" in the optical system. 1/30 P-V secondary mirrors can be substituted in rare cases of ultra-premium primary mirrors.

Primary Mirror Cable Sling Lower Edge Support

$175.00, all apertures

All Teeter's Telescopes come standard with a Kevlar "strap" sling to support the lower edge of our primary mirrors. Such support is well suited for full thickness or near full thickness mirrors. However, those mirrors measuring 1-3/8" or less in thickness will benefit from a Steel Cable Sling system mounted at the Center of Gravity of the mirror. Pricing includes the Cable Sling System and installation/adjustment.

Cable Sling System designed and manufactured by Howie Glatter, whose system "uses wire rope in order to eliminate sling stretch. Stainless steel wire rope, plastic-jacketed to provide a cushion between metal and glass, provides an almost ideal sling material. With adequately sized wire rope, stretch under the mirror's weight is negligible. With the narrow cable it is easy to ensure that the sling acts at the plane of the mirror's center of mass. Small self-adhesive Velcro guide strips, forming a notch for the cable, are placed on the mirror edge at the bottom and sides keeping the sling in place front-to-back."

Howie goes on to say, "I replace the usual split sling bolts with hardened stainless steel shafts and hang the sling from low friction linear ball bearings that ride on the shafts. The sling support points move with the mirror when it is adjusted forward or backward, and the sling always hangs straight down onto the mirror, parallel to the mirror plane, eliminating out-of-plane forces and the resulting 'aslingmatism.'"

Mechanical Upgrades

Moonlite Dual Speed Crayford Focuser

For serious planetary and lunar work, most observers prefer a focuser with both coarse and fine focus modes. The fine focus adjustment (8:1 reduction) on the Moonlite Dual Speed Crayford Focuser allows the user to "zero-in" on fine details in Jupiter's cloud bands and ridges and valleys on the Moon more easily than the Single Speed version. Like the Single Speed version, the Dual Speed includes a 1.25" adapter with a brass compression ring and 2" filter threads (ie. use 2" filters with 1.25" eyepieces), and a built-in 2" compression ring.

Starlight Instruments Dual Speed FeatherTouch Focuser

When only the best will do, the Starlight Feathertouch focuser is there! Regarded as the finest focuser commercially available, the Feathertouch offers a 10:1 fine focus reduction. Materials utilized in the construction included stainless steel, brass and anodized aluminum. 2" and 1.25" brass compression rings are standard, as is the ability to rotate the focuser for ergonomic use. A 1.25" adapter is included and comes standard with 2" filter threads (ie. use 2" filters with 1.25" eyepieces).

Observing Aides

AstroCrumb 2" Filter Slide, Mark II (for Feathertouch Focusers)

$109.00 - Filter Slide

$69.00 - Omega Dew Terminator

$55.00 - Birch Storage Case

StellarVue Optical Finderscopes and Mounting Rings

• Stellarvue fully multicoated, doublet objective;
• A fully multicoated, correct image 90 degree erecting prism;
• A 1 1/4" helical focuser with rubber grip;
• A high quality fully multicoated eyepiece with large eye lens, generous eye relief and a 50 degree field of view (Other conventional 1.25" eyepieces may be used with this finder);
• Cross hair reticle. Both the eyepiece and the reticle may be focused independently;
• Fully rotating back for comfortable placement of the eyepiece;
• Now you can add the Rigel Pulse Guide illuminator directly to the included eyepiece.