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Many will have heard that the Mond Equatorial was very kindly bequeathed by Dr Glyn Marsh to the Norman Lockyer Observatory several years ago. This telescope was originally installed at NLO in 1933 and consisted of 4 ex-RFC aerial reconnaiscence lenses mounted on a huge equatorial for taking wide field images of the night sky. It was modelled on the Yerkes Bruce Equatorial 10″ lens which Barnard used to image wide swathes of the Milky Way for his research into dark nebulae. Jim Lockyer and Frank McClean had visited Barnard in 1909 and had presumably decided that they wanted one too! However it was not until 1933 when Sir Robert Mond (wealthy industrial chemist and founder of ICI) provided funds for a new dome and telescope henceforth named the Mond Equatorial. After a productive life of 30 years this telescope was sold in the mid 1980’s to the late Glyn Marsh who refurbished it and had it set up on the Isle of Man. Sadly the original base of the equatorial was smashed by builders when it was being dismantled. We are now installing the Mond as a museum exhibit at NLO and are making steady progress. The main OTA has been shot blasted and repainted and the whole assembly of 4 cameras is nearing completion. We are hoping to finish the exhibit in the next few months.
David Strange
Chairman
Norman Lockyer ObservatoryAttachments:
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