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"I went
to bed at about 10PM and I let it run all night without focusing.
I blinked through the images and focus did not
change. Also, I did all of my other images by letting it run
through the night without focusing." 1m prime focus telescope, aerospace
corporation AeroTel, Jenoptik, Carl Zeiss Optics
- Mel Helm, Sierra
Remote Observatories, 16" f3.75
Dream Astrograph owner |
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20"
f3.5 Dream Astrograph - corrected Newtonian |
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Faster f-ratio
Dream Hypergraphs are listed near the bottom half of page. |
The
only athermal
instruments
in the world that use such a high percentage of carbon fiber (95% of the weight of the telescope
structures without optics)
and mates those low-mass,
high stiffness athermal structures with highly engineered, lightweight
zeroDELTA™
mirrors.
The entire system is optimized from the ground up for cutting
edge installed performance, eliminating countless
areas of performance
loss.
These are truly modern instruments with unrivaled consistent long-term installed
performance
and the lowest possible maintenance. |
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spectrograph, optical
instrument, electro-optics, photonics, instrument designer |
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Optimized for IMX461: 101 megapixels |
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11656 x 8742 with 3.76µm
pixels |
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Field Of View: 63.2' x 84.3' (1.48 deg²) |
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0.44 arc-sec/pixel |
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20"
f3.5 Dream Astrograph shown |
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OTA diameter - OD |
length |
focal length |
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24" |
68.0" |
1780mm - f3.5 |
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secondary |
weight - pounds |
single unit pricing |
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7.25" |
86 |
contact Dream |
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100% illumination
of 55mm image circle - will work with IMX455 & IMX461 detectors |
Note image of mounted
telescope - only 3, 20# counterweights are required |
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Performance Starts
At The Substrate™ |
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The zeroDELTA™
engineered primary mirror is 20.5" physical OD, over 3" tall,
yet weighs only 20.0 pounds. Delivering unrivaled performance & SWaP-C. |
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The latest CMOS detectors have much, much smaller
pixels (3.76µm versus the typical 9µm pixels of the
previous generation of detectors). Dream and our existing customers
don't need to upgrade anything. Our optical instruments have
always achieved higher performance and we've always designed
closer to the diffraction limit. In 2020 alone we designed more
than a half a dozen optical systems ranging from 16" to
25", with f-ratios from f2.95 to as fast as f1.35 and for
sensors from as small as 24mm x 36mm to as large as 95mm x 95mm. |
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Roughly 90% of what Dream designs
& produces is custom. Contact us to determine whether your
project can use an existing design, a slightly modified existing
design or requires something completely custom. We've been designing
fast optical systems since 2003. Our lead optical engineer has
four decades of experience with fast systems. |
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Buy The Best. Only
Cry Once.™ |
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Click either photo (left or
right) to watch a video about the interferometry technology developed
for JWST and funded by NASA. Dream uses this technology to finish
its world-class lightweight mirrors in house. |
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Click here
to see images taken with a 16" Dream Astrograph during test
out at Dream around 2010, then over 10 years later. |
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"Achieving superb performance is a goal, but achieving that
same high level of performance as the instrument changes angle
and as temperature changes, is the signature of a Dream optical
system." lightShane Santi - Dream Founder &
President |
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Download raw, full-frame FITS
files from this
folder to see the
world-leading performance from a 20" f3.5 Dream Astrograph. |
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Absolutely no processing was done to any of the raw files. Most
test images are 5 seconds, to show the performance of the system,
as opposed to allowing numerous errors to form a round, but bloated
star. Real-world performance should be judged from uncropped,
unaltered raw images. Ask manufacturers for raw, full-frame files
that use short exposures. Otherwise the shape of the stars can
be misleading because long exposures can average/randomize to
hide numerous issues. Don't settle for cropped images that are
used to show a sweet spot or processed images. If the optical
system has dealt with all of the traditional issues
and truly has world-class performance, it shouldn't need to hide
behind anything. Higher installed performance means both higher
resolution & achieving a deeper magnitude faster. |
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Athermal by design - Focus was not touched
for any of the test images, which spanned two different nights;
October 30th, 2018 and November 3rd, 2018. Dream tested this
telescope over more than a 20°F temperature change and still
couldn't detect degradation to the on or off-axis quality. This
athermal performance, combined with the high stiffness of not
just the materials but the designs that Dream uses, provides
unprecedented stability & consistency. Dream has an extremely
fast thermal
time constant because it has fully
dealt with both mirror
seeing and instrument seeing. The optimization
of so many parameters delivers the lowest possible maintenance
& highest
throughput. |
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Optical alignment of this and all Dream Astrograph telescopes
is achieved during the day by using the dedicated alignment tools
shipped with the optical instruments. |
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High Performance Doesn't
Fear Change. It Defies The Status Quo.™ |
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Both the lightweight primary &
secondary mirrors are coated with First Contact prior to shipping.
This protects the precision optics during shipment & provides
pristine optical surfaces for Dream's customers. |
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Dream is the world leader in installed high-performance
opto-mechanical systems because we have dealt directly with the
traditional performance losses associated with; stiffness in
structures and the thermal
issues within and around mirrors. From day one Dream has
focused on its engineered, high-consistency CFSC™ & CF structures that offer far
higher stiffness and are used extensively
in the instrument, not just one or two components. Dream has
also pushed the zeroDELTA™
lightweight mirrors to unrivaled
performance levels. Both of these technologies are designed
& produced in-house, giving Dream unusual control, optimization
and performance gains from this closed-loop approach. |
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Dream has unmatched full instrument stiffness
with no focus shift due to sky location & no settling affect
either. Dream's customers can slew to & immediately image.
Because of the high stiffness and athermal nature of Dream's
dedicated carbon fiber structures & the zeroDELTA™ lightweight mirrors, these opto-mechanical
systems are at the cutting edge of both mechanical and thermal
performance. Dream's customers are at the point of the needle
in a haystack. For this reason Dream will never be mass-market. |
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If an optical system shows focus shifts at different instrument
angles, it's a red flag that mechanical bending of the structure(s)
is occurring. Adjusted focus images are not a true indication
of performance, because it adds yet another area for performance
loss. Mechanical bending often means off-axis performance has
been lowered because the optics are not being held in a tight
tolerance for alignment. Actual high-performance means keeping
the optics aligned & focused to today's modern and very tight
tolerances, not tolerances from 50 to 100 years ago. |
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What the instrument does on a horizontal test bench tells you
nothing about that instrument's installed (dynamic) performance.
Ask a manufacturer for raw images where focus and collimation
were not touched at all during a full night of testing, assuming
the instrument was tested in a real environment at all. Dream's
optical instruments set a new standard, through our disruptive,
complimentary & enabling technologies. |
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Unbiased Evaluation
Of Performance; Mechanical & Thermal |
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All exposures
are 5 seconds, unless otherwise noted. All exposures were taken
through the luminance filter. |
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Night of October 30th, 2018 - |
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3333 & 3334: ~30° zenith-angle, pointing west |
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3337: ~30° zenith-angle, pointing north |
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3337: ~30° zenith-angle, pointing north |
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3338: 45-50° zenith-angle, pointing north |
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3347 & 3348: zenith |
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3350 & 3351: 30-35° zenith-angle, pointing south |
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3352: ~55° zenith-angle, pointing WSW |
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3357 & 3358: ~50° zenith-angle, pointing WNW |
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3367: M31 near zenith |
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3368: M31 near zenith (30 second exposure) |
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Night of November 3rd, 2018 - |
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3373: near zenith |
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3374: near zenith (30s exposure) |
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3409 & 3412: M33 near zenith (30s exposures), ~2.25 hours
after 3373 & 3374 images above |
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The CCD used during
testing: KAI-11002, 9µm pixels, 4008 x 2672 (full-format,
42mm diagonal). |
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Dream provides pristine optics. |
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Shipped November 27th, 2018, to start
a 5-year NASA program of NEO search & recovery. |
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One of Dream's 16" f3.75 instruments was
one of a seven group previous NASA NEO search & recovery
project. At least one other group member was using a 1m telescope,
showing the extreme power, throughput & reliability of Dream's
philosophy of fully dealing with the traditional issues of low
stiffness and mirror seeing. |
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20"
f2.4 Dream Hypergraph |
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OTA diameter - OD |
length |
focal length |
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24" |
42.5" |
1225mm - f2.4 |
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space domain awareness |
satellite debris tracking |
510mm CA |
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space domain awareness |
space situational awareness |
NASA NEO search & recovery |
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secondary |
weight - pounds |
single unit pricing |
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10" |
<88 |
contact Dream |
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IMX411 151Mp CMOS detector: 3.76µm pixels, 14192 x
10640, 66.7mm image circle. |
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Field Of View: 112.2' x 149.4' (4.65 deg²) |
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Arc-seconds/pixel: 0.63 |
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These dedicated optical systems are optimized
for 100% illumination of the given detector. The Dream Hypergraphs
come with 90mm of back focus. |
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20"
f2.4 Dream Hypergraph |
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OTA diameter - OD |
length |
focal length |
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24" |
42.5" |
1225mm - f2.4 |
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space domain awareness |
satellite debris tracking |
510mm CA |
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space domain awareness |
space situational awareness |
NASA NEO search & recovery |
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secondary |
weight - pounds |
single unit pricing |
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9.8" |
<84 |
contact Dream |
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IMX461 101Mp CMOS detector: 3.76µm pixels, 11656 x
8742, 55mm image circle. |
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Field Of View: 92.4' x 123.0' (3.16 deg²) |
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Arc-seconds/pixel: 0.63 |
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These dedicated optical systems are optimized
for 100% illumination of the given detector. The Dream Hypergraphs
come with 90mm of back focus. |
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pricing, availability and
specifications subject to change without notice |
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Copyright
© 2003-2023 Dream All Rights Reserved. |
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space domain awareness (SDA),
space Situational Awareness (SSA), Ball Aerospace, Lockheed martin,
Boeing space, Airbus defence & space, planewave instruments,
NASA JPL, NASA goddard, lightweight telescope, lightweight precision
optics, lightweight precision mirrors |