How to Make a Telescope, 2nd Ed.

By Jean Texereau

Product Information: 9.38" by 6.00", 440 pages, hardbound.

The first edition of How to Make a Telescope was universally acclaimed as the best book ever written for making a Newtonian telescope. This 2nd Edition is almost three times larger and adds to the original text new chapters on making a Cassegrainian telescope, optical windows, and equatorial mounts. Chapters on eyepieces and astronomical seeing have been expanded. Computer programs written in generic BASIC for reduction of Foucault test data. Included are indexes for the three principle magazines that carry telescope making information: Sky and Telescope's "Gleanings for ATM's" from November 1941 through June 1998, Scientific American magazine from 1925 through 1959 and the complete run of Telescope Making magazine. This book is the most complete single work available on making reflecting telescopes. Here is how two leading astronomy magazines reviewed the 2nd Edition:

". . . Borrowed from my high school library more than 20 years ago, the earlier book (the First Edition) was my introduction to an avocation that has occupied many evenings and weekends since. That fondly remembered volume forms the core of this new one, with many additions to complement and expand the older text. Reading the text in preparation for this review was like rediscovering an old friend. Key to the book's quality is Texereau's writing style, his workshop hints, diagrams and where appropriate, expansions into theory. The accent is upon the practical --- details of just what it takes to fabricate an optical telescope . . .

"In the sections devoted to optics both novice and experienced "glass-pushers" will receive guidance that is as clear and in-depth as any that can be found in print . . .

"From the earlier edition he has retained complete instructions on the fabrication of a Newtonian telescope, including optics and mounting, and provides a well-written rationale for its choice as the novice's first telescope. For the new edition he has added detailed plans for the construction of a Cassegrain telescope, including both the primary and secondary optics. He even devotes a section—definitely not novice stuff — to fabrication of an optical window . . .

"I heartily recommend this new edition of How to Make a Telescope, both to the recently interested telescope maker and the seasoned "telescope nut." Novices will find the spicy, well-illustrated and detailed book that inspired me many years ago, while even old hands should find some new wrinkles within its greatly enlarged text.."
--Sky & Telescope magazine

Browsing through a library one day, my hands fell on a remarkable book. It was the thin first edition of Jean Texereau's How to Make a Telescope . . . here was Texereau describing in simple terms how to complete an instrument from start to finish and doing so without "talking down" to the reader . . . You can imagine my growing concern as this book became increasingly hard to find . . . I once offered someone $10 for a scruffy paperback copy, but he refused the money! Finally in 1984, Willmann-Bell announced the second edition of this TM classic . . . What is the result? The translation flows effortlessly . . . the book has that same feeling of total mastery as the original . . . The new edition is much thicker than the first and has become a manual for advanced workers, as well as a beginner's tutorial. The difference between Texereau's and other telescope-making books is the sophistication of his testing procedures. Other authors speak confidently of pitch and grits, and topics of interest in actually producing a mirror, but most fail to give the beginner a reliable method of testing and interpreting the test results. Not so with Texereau: he gives you the full story. With this book, you have every chance of building what Texereau calls "a telescope that is optically beyond reproach."
—Astronomy magazine

. . a precise, detailed, concrete exposition and authoritative guide and reference on amateur telescope mirror making and for the hobbyist in amateur astronomy.
—New Technical Books, The New York Public Library

The best guide to making a Newtonian telescope.
— Observer’s Handbook: The Royal Astronomical Society of Canada.

. . . a precise, detailed, concrete exposition and authoritative guide and reference on amateur telescope mirror making and for the hobbyist in amateur astronomy.
—New Technical Books, The New York Public Library