So You Want to Make a Telescope?

Great!

If you take this step, you will join a mutually supportive community of Amateur Telescope Makers worldwide. It is a constant source of wonder to me just how easy it is for most amateurs, using extremely simple materials, to make telescope optics which often exceed the performance of those in commercial telescopes. You can do it too!

As with any new undertaking, there are things you need to consider before you dive in. I suggest that the following would be a reasonable course of preliminary action:

• Read the ATM FAQ , which answers Frequently Asked Questions about our hobby.

• Read a decent book on the subject. There is a list of ATM books, with comments on each, on my books page. Note that there is a wider variety of ATM books available from the US.
  Of these, I think the best for a newcomer is Neale Howard's The Standard Book for Telescope Making. It is out of print, but is available second-hand from www.bibliofind.com

• Join the ATM Mailing List at http://www.atmlist.net/mailman/listinfo.cgi/atm,and take a look at the ATM Mailing List Archives. This is probably the most powerful ATM resource currently available.

• If you think you wish to proceed, check out some US ATM suppliers or UK ATM Suppliers.

Click Here for more ATM Links.

UK ATM Resources
Astronomy Links
The Astronomical Unit