Observatory Structure

The Astronomia no Telhado observatory is located in Rio de Janeiro, under a Bortle 7 sky, and operates beneath a movable roof. This article tells how it was built and how an imaging night works: the three telescopes, the roof, the weather monitoring and the path the images take to the website.

The observatory

The observatory is a home setup: it sits in the city, under the urban sky of Rio de Janeiro (Bortle 7), and was designed to work under these conditions, with equipment and techniques suited to light pollution. All the equipment is protected by a movable roof and is controlled remotely.

Movable roof

The roof is movable and operated by Tuya devices: it opens for the imaging night and closes to protect the equipment.

Weather and safety

The observatory has a weather station, other sensors and weather forecasting systems to track sky conditions and decide when to observe. The Sky now page shows current conditions, a satellite image of the clouds over Southeast Brazil and the night’s forecast, in 3-hour steps. The observatory’s status and sensors appear on the Observatory page.

The three telescopes

Three instruments make the captures. Each has its own page, with capabilities, possibilities, a field-of-view simulator, recent captures and finished images.

• Main telescope: Sky-Watcher 200P f/5 on a HEQ5 mount, with ASIAIR Mini, motorized focuser (EAF), filter wheel (EFW), coma corrector, ZWO ASI294MC Pro and ASI294MM Pro cameras and 1.25″ Optolong filters.
• Seestar S50 Eq: ZWO smart telescope, 50 mm and f/5, in equatorial mode.
• Seestar S30 Pro Eq: ZWO smart telescope, 30 mm and f/5.3, in equatorial mode.

From the sky to the website

The captures are recorded, and the images processed in AstroFITS v2 reach the equipment pages. The photographed objects are in Deep-Sky Objects, and the observatory’s sessions are in Observatory Captures.