reassembled and collimated

With the mirror cleaned, its centre marked, and reloaded into the cell, I reinstalled the cell in Mom's Super Space Conqueror. I then collimated the 'scope.

I first used Guy's Tectron kit. I followed some collimation notes at the Amateur Astronomers Magazine web site for using the sighting tube and lining up the secondary. I found John Reed's ray-trace diagrams and notes very helpful for when using the chesire. The second mirror angle was off so I removed it and changed the angle on the bench, in the vice. Now the primary was way off so I brought it back in line. I then used the autocollimator and I could see I was very close to where I should be.

When I first tried the laser collimator, the secondary was off. I re-aimed the beam to the centre of the primary. Now the laser beam is a mere 4 mm away from the start. Not bad.

In my travels I had found another article on collimating, over at Astro-Tom. I'll have to try these similar steps to see if I can improve, simplify, and speed the process with Mom's 'scope.