Los Angeles herald., 1907-07-10
NEW TELESCOPE
BEING NOUN TED
Five-Foot Lens Is Fast Nearing Conn.,
pleton and Professor Ritchey
Expects Good Results
from Work
Pasadena Agency,
n North Raymond Avenue,
Phones: Sunset 1907. Home 2124.


PASADENA, July 9.-At the shops OF
the Mt. Wilson solar observatory on SAN
ia Barbara street in this city the tower
has just been erected for a new solar
telescope. The instrument is being in
stalled at the shops for experimental pur-
poses in order to test it's efficiency BEFORE
going to the expense of transporting It
10 the top of the mountain, where 1t will
ultimately be placed II the preliminary
tests are satisfactory. Prof. Ritchey
hopes for good results from the instru-
ment considering its size, only twelve
inches in diameter with focal length OF
sixty feet.
This is to be a perpendicular telescope
pointing directly to the zenith with coe-
Iostat placed above it to reflect the light
from the sun into the lens that makes the
image. The telescope itself is station
airy and is anchored to the steel tower.
1t is the adjustability of the coelostat, or
rejecting mirror, that makes it possible
to throw the image of the sun into the
magnifying tense from any angle in its
course through the heavens.
is found eXpedient to get the point of en-
trance for the light into the instrument
as far as possible from the earths sur
face, as the heat and vapors near the
surface so befog the atmosphere that it
is hard to get clear images. For this rea-
son Prof Ritchey In charge. of the. solar
observatory of the Carnegie institution on
Mt. Wilson is trying the experiment of d
perpendicular telescope on the peak
Just the opposite from this is the So
called snow telescope already in use on
Wilson's peak. 1t is the same length as
the new one, being go feet, but twice the
diameter. or "a inches, and it is placed IN
a horizontal stationary position. Light
is reflected into it by the coelostat in
much the same way as it will be thrown
into the new instrument. In Photographic
work the stationary rejecting telescope
has been found superior to the revolving
instrument.
Building Big Telescope
Much greater than the instrument just
described is the big tiVefoot telescope
provided for with Carnegie funds which is
now nearing completion at the shops here.
1t will be mounted in dome siXtE feet
In diameter and will be revolving so that
il may be pointed toward any part of the
planetary universe. 1t will be much the
largest and most powerful instrument on
the Pacific coast, there being only one as
large in the United States.
The lens wiz weigh five tons. A spe-
cial forty horsepower motor truck is be-
ing constructed to haul this heavy load
that even this powerful machine will be
equal to the task over the grades of the
new mountain trail, built especially for
About twenty-five men are employed at
the shops here under the direction of
Prof. Ritchey, who gives every detail of
the work on these delicate instruments
his personal supervision. There are three
expert draughtsmen, designers, machin
lists and specialists in each line of work.
Polishing of the big five-foot lens is prac-
tically completed, but grinding the d.
mansions to true measurements which
must be exact to the millionth part of an
inch is still in progress and may require
two months yet for it's final completion.
Materials for the steel dome are here and
ready to be taken to the mountain peak.
Some persons have got the telescope
now nearing completion confused with
the one provided for by a $4,000 fund, the
Gift of Hon. John d. Hooker of Los An
seles. More powerful than any telescope
ever yet constructed will be the instru-
nent provided for by Mr. Hooker, but 1t
will be some time yet before work will
tegin on this iE the local shops.
An order has been given in France for
the mammoth glass in the rough for the
lense which is to be one hundred inches
in diameter when cut and polished, Three
or four years work will be required on
this instrument in the shops here after
the glass is imported in the rough from
abroad.
A new building will be erected at the
Santa Barbara street shops to house it
and work will commence on the lens as
soon as it is received No factory in the
country is equipped for making the glass
die for such a large tense and 1t Is ques-
tionable whether the shops abroad will
not have some difficulty in the execution
Of such unusual work
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