Alcoat

I generally have my 16" mirror recoated at ten year intervals but I decided to do it two years earlier than planned for various reasons. I selected alcoat to do my recoat for several reasons. First, it's relatively close to me in that I'm in Socal and alcoat is in Nocal so I didn't have to ship my mirror very far and the cost to do so is significantly less than shipping out of state or to the east coast where another popular coater called majestic is located. Both the latter and alcoat are reportedly one man operations wherein the work is done in a garage with a standard aluminum coat and quartz overcoat applied by the vendor. Alcoat is significantly less expensive than any other coater and at total initial cost of $135.00 including shipping, there's no comparo in terms of cost, period. Notice I stated "initial cost" because alcoat refunded me an additional twelve bucks and change that I didn't know I had coming to me because the shipping cost was actually less than anticipated. In other words, you're dealing with an honest gentleman. 
Turnaround time was a reasonable week and a half for decoat and recoat. The new coating looks beautiful as they usually do and I'll hopefully have first light with it soon.
I upgraded my secondary from an older but serviceable 3.1" discovery elliptical mirror to the high end antares optical secondary mirror from their website:
http://www.antaresoptics.com/
Check out alcoat here:
http://www.alcoat.net/
along with an image of the veteran coater Bob Fies of alcoat pictured with John Dobson when Dobson was still with us:
http://www.alcoat.net/al_4-00.htm
Hopefully Bob Fies will be coating mirrors for many years to come and I'm glad I had him service my mirror.

Very nice! That seems like a really good price for a 16-inch mirror. From beginning to end, receipt to delivery, several hours work for sure. And Al/SiO2 should be a very durable coating.  Tom

Finally got the scope out last night in front of my home and despite the fact that I've got moderate light pollution and a crescent moon up till midnight, the scope performed beautifully. Under the aforementioned conditions with decent transparency and seeing, and while it just many be my personal bias entering into it, the images equaled or perhaps exceeded my expectations. I hit the major constellations around the zenith and that means Canes Venatici and Coma Berenices and that means galaxies and lots of them! For the best views under my observing conditions, I used a 17mm type four nagler with a CLS filter. I find this focal length works optimally with my filter and it wrings out detail that otherwise might be invisible under my skies. First up, M51, with detail in the structure that also held up well with a 10mm Ethos eyepiece. I hit six more messier/NGC galaxies in CV including the whale and the pup and the hockey stick. And no, I didn't forget M3 either! In Coma, M98 and M99 are a real treat along with NGC 4565 M88, M91(aka missing the messier) NGC 4725, M64, and the globular cluster, M53.  Although more into the light pollution for my locale I spent some time with the sombrero in Virgo and M81/82 in Ursa Major. 
I rounded out the evening with a detailed viewing of Jupiter with numerous intricacies in the belts and bands in a 9mm ES 100 AFOV and a paracor. 
I chose to replace my astrosystems/Discovery(same maker) 3.1" secondary because its coating was a bit weatherbeaten and since neither alcoat or majestic offer an enhanced aluminum coating and the other local boys are pretty much dog nuts on their prices for an enhanced recoat, I went with a new high end secondary from antares optical, see link in my initial post in this thread, and that comes with a highly enhanced coating along with interferometry data. 
If memory serves, I recall Roland Christian posting about a serious observer who frequently recoated his mirrors and claimed to discern a noticeable difference in performance. That was my impression last night and my optics have previously held their own and then some up against similar apertures under dark skies. In fact, Roland's statement about my primary mirror data on a real and not a synthetic interferometry report as posted on the Astromart years ago was, "quite nice mirror actually". 
I think it's optimal now with a new coating from alcoat...

Hi all,

I just sent my 50 year old (1965) 8" F/4.5 Cave mirror to Alcoat today. I believe this will be my third time using Alcoat. Can't beat their prices and my other two mirrors came back with an excellent coatings. I also agree that Bob Fies is an honest gentleman as well. He has always refunded me for my shipping overpayments to the penny

Keith (Scopejunkie)

Attached Image:

Keith,
I noticed in your user profile that you have the means to test optics. I read one of the reviews on the alcoat site by an ATM who did just that and found pre and post coating values to be virtually identical. It would be interesting if you might consider doing the same. I found my optic to be delivering optimum performance after the recoat so I'm delighted with alcoat's service and I believe your experience with it would be of value to the general readership of the forum. 
Hope to read more from you...

The mirror will be tested As a visual observer I find a high power image at the eyepiece (moon, planets, stars) to be my final "test." The star test and Ronchi tests were quite good even with the coatings in "see through" condition. The mirror will be tested for increase in image quality (sharpness, contrast, and scatter) and how deep these old eyes can go with it. I will let you know my results.

Keith (Scopejunkie)

All,

Just got the mirror back from Alcoat. Quick turnaround. Looks real good Bob even refunded me my overpayment of $0.10! I have a new secondary that should arrive today. Time to get this old Cave back under the stars!

Keith (Scopejunkie)

Originally Posted by Keith Lawson

All,

Just got the mirror back from Alcoat. Quick turnaround. Looks real good Bob even refunded me my overpayment of $0.10! I have a new secondary that should arrive today. Time to get this old Cave back under the stars!

Keith (Scopejunkie)

Keith,
Glad you've got your mirror back and Alcoat's got a good turnaround time. 
Any chance you can place your mirror on an optical bench and check the smoothness of its surface post recoat?

Rod,

My optical bench is the night sky. My only baseline for this mirror is the overall optical correction before the new coatings. The original coatings were quite bad. There were fingernail size holes that you could actually look through. Despite the severe weathering of the mirror there were no scratches in the glass. The seeing was bad last night so I will have to wait for a better night to test.

Keith (Scopejunkie)

Keith,
Good luck on the tests and your seeing conditions. Last night, Saturday 6-2, was one of the best in front of my home that I've ever seen. The transparency was incredible, thanks to a high pressure dome over SoCal. The seeing was poor early on and then firmed up enough to allow splendid views of galaxies. I could even see the milky way in Cygnus as it was rising up but well shy of the zenith. I was astounded on how much detail I could see in many galaxies as I viewed them in my 16" scope with an ES 14mm 100 AFOV eyepiece/paracor/CLS filter combo. It was just a great night and I observed until the moon rose over the horizon. I'm still jazzed about it!