Article: Cooling of Newtonian optics - an insight

I've just posted an article in the Telescope Bits and Bobs page about the cooling of Newtonian optics.  

While we have professional observatories to give us all the clues on how to best deal with cooling and dew prevention, it is all too often an area that is misunderstood and poorly implemented in amateur instruments.  In this article I look at several way of dealing with cooling with there being distinct requirements depending on telescope structure and with visual vs photo applications, and dew prevention and how this can be applied to our scopes, and where we often go wrong.  And often, poorly implemented cooling systems are also found on commercially made instruments, and while done with the best of intentions, can create more problems than solve.

This is not a 'how to' article, but one geared to helping understand the thermodynamics at play and things to avoid.  How these strategies are applied to individual instruments then very much depends on each scope, the application of the instrument and how the scope's owner can implement these.

I hope you find this article I've written helpful.

Clear skies and sharp pencils,

Alex.