2015 Convention Telescope Competition

All of the Telescopes Entered in the Competition

Winners of the Optical & Mechanical Competition

Convention attendees can enter their home-made telescopes in the Optical and/or Mechanical competition. Awards are given for best Optical Performance [Small Newtonian 12-inches or smaller; Large Newtonian over 12-inches; Compound Optical System] and for several Mechanical Categories [mechanical design, workmanship, innovative component, junior (under 16), special (for items that are not complete telescopes)].

First homemade telescope recognition: If you brought your first homemade telescope and displayed it on Breezy Hill, you got a certificate and your name was shown on the screen at the Saturday Night Program. These scopes are identified as  First Scope  in the listings.

The optical competition was completed on Saturday night (it was clouded out on Friday); the mechanical judging was done on Saturday morning and mechanical awards were passed out at the Saturday evening program. Optical awards will be mailed to the optical winners.

The Head Optical Judge for 2015 was Rick Hunter. Junie Esslinger, Alan French, Dave McGaw, Francis O'Reilly, Dick Parker and Don Schwarzkopf were optical judges. Cecilia Detrich and Steven Forbes were the optical runners.

The Head Mechanical Judge for 2015 was Chris Houghton. Jay Drew, Wayne Hilliardi, Dave Kelly, Jeff Lowe, Erik Pip, and Tom Spirock were mechanical judges.

The telescope competition registrars were Cecilia Detrich and Katie Shusdock. Scope photos by Ken Slater.

Below you will see up to four pictures of each telescope entered in the competition (fewer if we have less than four available, in some cases we received no photos of some entered telescopes, especially true of some optical only entries that were not available in daylight for photography) and basic information about the telescope and maker, including any awards won. Listed in order of entry.

Note: After you expand a photo, you can use the arrow keys to move forward and back, and the spacebar starts a slide show.

Newt = Newtonian Reflector; Dob = Dobsonian Mount;
GEM = German Equatorial Mount; Ball = Ball or Hemispherical Mount

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