1965 10" F8 CAVE RESTORATION PICTURES
First let me say thank you to all the great friends i have made out there, You have all blessed my life with your knowledge and friendship Clint Whitman.
Well a few weeks ago I started restoring older telescopes as stated on the previous page. This page is a set of pictures pertaining to the 1965 cave.
I
bought this on E-bay from Jim who got the scope shipped from cave to long
island new York in 1965, he was 16 and this was the biggest scope on
long island. In 1967 he was drafted and went to Vietnam, His dad got
transferred with his company to San Bernardino CA. (To my luck) Dad
took all the removable parts from the tube, eyepieces and the
mirrors wrapped them all up, boxed it then stuck the tube and mount
into the rafters of a garage in Claremont, CA. until I drug it down
2 weeks ago. Jim the kid whose now 58 gave me 3" pile of 1958 to 65
star charts and all the boxes his dad wrapped up, Sweet set of
Ortho's Astrolas. Astrola finder, Cool stuff.
Tripod parts and the cradles that came with it. One cradle is a non rotating 10" the blue one with the OG straps FOR SALE / Trade
This best describes the amount of work that can required if a mount is not taken care of for forty years.
After hours of emory cloth some day of oil and grease soaking, 3 hours of brass polishing, I got the main shaft out and one brass setting circle clean!
Its all uphill from there #$#$^&*!!!
Here is the Info. on this mess! Crammer Motors, now makes Bristol motors.
The Bristol Model 447 is still available (although the mount screw in the back is a special order item).
The part number for the "stock" unit is 12-154-00037.
Check www.cramer-motors.com for more information.
There response
Thank you for your recent inquiry for our Crammer brand motors. The Crammer Company sells through distribution. Please contact the following distributor with your requirement:
AED Distributors
Contact: Teresa Von Buren
E-mail: teresa@frontiernet.net
SO THE BOTTOM LINE IS $95 AND TEREASA WILL SEND YOU A MOTOR THAT YOU HAVE TO MAKE A MOUNT FOR! MORE ON THIS WHEN IT COMES IN THE MAIL.
The good news is the bearings and gears so far are like new in both of the scopes i have purchased. This is due in part to the people not knowing how they work so the loosened up the locking bolts on the shafts and didn't use the gears motors or clutches at all. But here is what i found.
RA drive gear information:
Gear on Motor: Boston Gear G127 - 10 tooth 48 pitch,
14.5 degree pressure angle
Gear on Worm shaft: Boston Gear G150 - 144 tooth gear,
same pitch and pressure angle.
The G150 drives a worm which in turn drives a 100 tooth gear on the RA shaft.
Note that the gear which fits on the motor shaft may need to be reamed out slightly to fit.
Check www.bostgear.com for the dealer in your area.
Hi all well its a week later and some people wanted to see the progress and what could be done to a 1964 Cave. Well I have been going at it after work and the mount has been the focus of the week I love Tom Cave and the simplicity of his engineering wow the more I repair and clean the more appreciation I have for his ideas. All the parts on this severely neglected mount are in like new condition, once you remove the crud and rust and whatever that other stuff was! Plus there really hard to make look really good. All in all a lot of hard work.
After a few hours of work it all comes back together better than new
After 40 years the tube and mount from a 1965 Cave meet again. Note the size difference to the F5 behind.
Well that's all on the mount for now when I get the motor from AED i will take the pictures of the clutch and gears with my design for the new motor mount.
Next on to the tube!!
1965 F8 10" CAVE mirror M651485
The motor came!! So here is my fix to mount it without the hole in the back of the motor. Without changing the mount. Works better now than the original ! Also I got 3 G127 gears sent and you can ream them out carefully and JB weld it to the shaft. should last for another 50 years.
Original Red/Orange neon light still works. Blue/green original lens cover ?
The tube is original gel coat finish so clean clean clean! Also I started sanding the connecting rods on the rotating rings and they are high quality steel so I polished and clear coated them.
I think them details are important to the final look.
The finder and focuser meet there old friend! Also one of the eyepieces tri plane 6mm astrola 1964.
The finder has really clean optics astrola brand. What's this trade mark I Can't seem to find it?
Here is A blast from yesteryear. Bottom of the cast aluminum focuser.
First light and no mirror its not back yet. And your humble author with really tore up hands from 40 years of gook scraping and foam engine bright in my hair.
. 
If you find this page and have more specific questions, please E-mail me at clintatclintsongdotcom
I have worked after work on Friday and all day Saturday on the tube. I am restoring the original fiberglass finish with the exception of one 1" white painted line from the eyepiece to the first rotating ring. This is due to four holes drilled in the tube for a star chart light box that Jim mounted in 65. I tried just gel coat but the white color of the tube is impossible to match. To fix the fiber glass it has been 320, 400. 600, rubbing compound, finish restorer. my arms hurt but the tube is looking better than new.
The amount of work that has gone into this scope is worth every hour due to the fact that upon the completion I know that it will be treasured from this point on by myself and anyone who gets it as the time goes by this is truly a work of art by masters of Americana Every bolt and casting is truly what made Americas manufacturing work force the greatest in the world.
This is what I am talking about!
Well the wayward E-bay Cave is done and what a trip it has been. The mirror was hand carried down to L&L Optical Richard is a great guy and did a fantastic job. He did the ^65 cave and the Pyrex 13.1 Coulter. I set up the Cave after work on Friday and had clear unstable skies but the scope blew my sox's off!! I am spoiled with good telescope, We have a tak 130f and a Meade 10" LX200 we run on a Losmandy G-11 so I am used to good views but on Orion the cave blew me away, lots of color in Orion like I see in my photos but not usually in the eyepiece. Tracking is excellent and boy am I relived lots of time and effort has gone into this scope so I am very excited that all the things you guys said about the 10" F8 Cave were true. Thanks for all the help from here and the cave group. Now I can start on the Latest and newest project start 1960 Unitron 4" with all the bells and whistles See you at the star party Clint and Debbie Whitman
Re-Coated with semi enhanced the original secondary mirror
The primary, Legendary, And to my luck extraordinary CAVE 1965 Enhanced coatings by L&L optical, Thanks Richard.
ReFurbished Cave cell
And then They meet again in as far as I can tell better than new condition! I cut down the collimating dot to a sliver and colored it black.
The star cave! Finally First light tonight.
I found a trash can that looked close and cut the bottom off for a great cap and a 99 cent store shower cap for the mirror end. And she's done A scope of a lifetime, first for James and now for Clint the CaveMan & Debbie the Cave Girl. SO EASY A CAVEMAN CAN DO IT!!
Final note from a CAVEMAN !!! Please if you see an old Telescope in need of a friend to love it and keep it safe and warm or cold, (depends on the season) Get an old single viynl bed liner for $6 and throw it on her, Dont stick your grubby finger in her eyes! tell her somone is going to find her and take her away from all this, give her a makeover and cherish her untill he dies. Thats what us CAVEMEN, UNITRONMEN,TASCOMEN, DO, Clint
