Telescope Rentals

Hello Everyone
Would like to runthis past everyone (do not know if it has been discussed before) but in my frustration to choose, purchase and use Astronomy equipment, I am considering the possibility of starting a telescope rental operation. I would offer the following refractors (to start)
TMB, Takahashi, TEC, Astro Physics, Stellavue and William Optics. I am considering the "High End Scopes' APO's Trippletts.... 110mm up to 150mm

I do not know anywhere you can go (except a local or national star party) to see differnt scopes (and NEAF) but can't really try them out for a week or two. I wonder if there would be a market for those of us who would like to try out the higher end scopes 1st before dropping 4K or more on a scope. Scopeguard case would be a must, and the ability to also rent any Nagler, Ethos, Meade or even Nikon eyepieces.

Just throwing this out for suggestions...
Thanks
Tony

I would think a stroke of bad luck could put you at odds with your insurance broker and that could put you out of business.

dan

Its a very interesting idea. Random thoughts....

There are many pro level camera lens rental companies, and these seem to have survived. They rent lenses selling for prices comparable to the APOs you mention. Could a telescope rental company be modeled around these? Of course their market is much larger...
http://www.lensprotogo.com/
http://www.borrowlenses.com/

Somehow the thought of shipping a high-end APO several times a month makes one worry. Are they designed for that abuse? Would it stay in collimation? Would you test the scopes before shipping to make sure they were still OK optically?

Might be interesting to rent SCTs also, but they are probably more fragile and need collimation more often. Probably any scope that needs frequent collimation or that has difficult collimation would be problematic. Would you really want renters (unknown skill level) attempting to collimate stuff? (Indeed you do not specifically mention SCTs.)

Rugged / simple Dob scopes like Meade LightBridge would also be a candidate.

Eyepieces seem like an easy item to rent -- small, relatively inexpensive, easily replaced, no collimation.

In a sense, Astromart would be your competition. You can buy a scope here and re-sell, probably for less total cost than a rental. But granted, you might have to wait a while for a certain APO to appear on Astromart. And there would be a large cash out-lay while you own it.

There have been a few scope rental outfits before, but they seem to quickly disappear....