12.5" Dobsonian Telescope Build

Follow along as I build this 12.5" Dobsonian telescope I designed in Solidworks

00:00 Mirror Box
14:45 Mirror Cell
27:40 Altitude Bearings
31:43 Rocker Box
34:40 Azimuth Bearing
36:28 Upper Tube Assembly
40:28 Truss Tubes
42:11 Finished Telescope
42:53 First Light

Info on the scope:
Mirrors are from a donor Discovery 12.5"
It's a 12.5" f4.8.
First time welding aluminum so bear with me.

Music at the end by Maarten Schellekens
https://freemusicarchive.org/music/ma...

I used Newt for the Web to get some basic dimensions of the mechanical structure and Plop for the design of the mirror cell. I also based a lot of the design on my 20" Telekit as it was easy to reference as it's stored in my garage shop.

Some design considerations:

Upper Tube Assembly needs to store inside the mirror box, ala the telekit. I do a lot of exploring that takes my down some rough 4x4 trails and the less stuff to bang around the better.

Minimize visible hardware. This is purely aesthetic.

Truss tubes connect inside the mirror box. Also an aesthetic choice, it looks much cleaner to me than having the truss connecting hardware all over the outside.

Front collimation knobs. I an often observing solo and the process of walking from the cheshire eyepiece to the back of the mirror cell to adjust collimation takes forever, often leaving me with a collimation that is "close enough".

Fast cool down. I often observe in the desert and the temp can drop 20 degrees within an hour of sunset. The mirror is also pretty thick, 2.15" (55mm) so it can take a minute.

18 point fully supported whiffle tree design cell. Yes, its absolutely complete overkill but a dob but I want to eventually make some larger eq mounted astrographs and figured this would get me some good experience with the design and manufacture. Down the line I also want to make a similar cell for my 20" as the Astrosystems design while simple is a bit outdated.

I am building this in my home garage shop and don't have access to anything like a lathe or mill. Everything had to be doable with a table saw, miter saw, drill press and router.