Announcing LightBuckets Hosting Plus
September 08, 2009
Why just have your telescope hosted when you can put it to work making money for you too? Today we are announcing a unique new hosting program, one that only LightBuckets can offer, called LightBuckets Hosting Plus. It gives you the opportunity to have your imaging system professionally hosted at our remote facility in the southwestern desert of New Mexico while also providing you with the possibility to earn money by making your unused telescope time available for purchase by LightBuckets customers.
It's your observatory.
When you want to image with your telescope, you can simply use LightBuckets to set up and manage your imaging run. Or, you can easily block off the observatory schedule from LightBuckets and set up your imaging run directly through your observatory computer using whatever software you prefer. We do require that you do not preempt LightBuckets customer's Schedule for Now and Schedule for Later runs that are planned for your observatory.
Your system is completely secure.
The way LightBuckets is designed, our rental customers will never be on your observatory directly...all observatory management is handled via the LightBuckets servers and our automation system. It’s a level of security and peace of mind we require for our own telescopes and that we demand for yours as well.
What’s in it for you?
We can't guarantee specific revenue amounts by being a Hosting Plus customer. It is dependent on how often your telescope is available for rent (i.e., how often you aren't using it) and what price you choose to charge for rental time. The rental rates are completely up to you, although we do have minimum rental rate requirements. We will share the revenue 60/40, in your favor. You’ll receive a check from LightBuckets every month from your observatory rental revenues from the previous month.
What we deliver.
We will provide the location, the structure (22' x 22' split roof roll off building), the pier (each pier will have a 3' operating radius from the center of the pier), power/power management, connectivity (T1 line already in place), and sensors (cloud sensor, weather station, seeing monitor, in-structure and outside cameras, etc.).
In addition, we would provide installation and maintenance support for your on-site equipment, up to two hours per month included with additional support/maintenance available for a fee. We can accommodate a total of nine Hosting Plus customers in our new building.
Our high-desert location (elevation approximately 4,200 feet) offers pristine skies (21.9-22.0 magnitude per square arcsecond on moonless nights), excellent weather (287 sunny days per year, 11 inches of rain), and excellent seeing (1.5-2.5" on average). We do experience a “windy season” typically in April where it is common to have 40-60mph winds many days. We also have the southwest monsoon season which lasts from around the beginning of July to mid-September where most days have heavy afternoon clouds and occasional strong thunderstorms.
Finally, we will provide the access to a strong base of rental customers via the LightBuckets website. We have hundreds of visitors a day looking to rent a unique telescope. What’s more, we have hundreds of existing customers interested in new instruments especially dedicated science platforms with photometric filters. We handle all of the sales, marketing, public relations, and other activities to generate traffic to the website. We also take care of any customer inquiries about their imaging runs (you give us the authority to refund LightBuckets points should a customer be unhappy with image data obtained on your instruments).
We are also authorized dealers for RC Optical Systems, Software Bisque Paramount ME's, Apogee, Takahashi, and Astrodon so we can provide any components you'd like to use.
The bottom line.
The monthly hosting fee is $1,750 per month and we require a two-year Hosting Plus commitment. There is a one-time $1,000 set up fee. We are accepting deposits for the first building with nine available spaces. Deposits are $2,750 - $1,000 for set up and $1,750 for the first month’s hosting fee.
The requirements.
There are minimum requirements for being a LightBuckets Hosting Plus customer which includes the following:
* Telescopes from RC Optical Systems (PIR and TCC II required as well, FFC highly recommended), Takahashi, Astro-Physics, or ASA. Others are possible, ask us.
* Apogee or SBIG cameras. Other models of cameras are possible.
* Astrodon MonsterMOAG or MegaMOAG off axis guider (no guide scopes at long focal lengths…too many flexure issues).
* SBIG ST-402E guide cameras or other suitable alternatives.
* 7-9 slot filter wheel.
* LRGB, plus Ha, SII, and OIII highly desired. Photometric V filter is valuable. Photometric filters on systems dedicated to science imaging.
* Software Bisque Paramount ME mount with counterweights.
* Power managed via a BayTech (RC-3 or RC-4) or DataProbe (iBootBar) power management system.
* ACP, MaximDL, TheSky, and FocusMax installed and completely configured properly (as well as ASCOM 5.0). TCC applet installed for RCOS RC's. Commercial license for ACP.
* Less than 2 year old PC running Windows XP, 2GB RAM, 300GB hard drive.
* Any other accessories, hardware, or software required for your instruments to be fully operational.
If you are interested in LightBuckets Hosting Plus, please contact me directly at steve@lightbuckets.com.
Comments
There's no doubt that there is some investment involved, but I wanted to at least give folks the opportunity to recoup some of the expense. This really is something that none of the other telescope hosting facilities can offer. We'll see how it goes. To put your message in perspective, $40K would buy about 800 hours of time on the .61m RC (LB-0001) at $50/hour...that's about 1/4 of the available hours per year...so, you're right, it would buy a lot of telescope time on LightBuckets (something to consider for folks who are thinking about buying their own rigs...LightBuckets is a pretty good deal if I do say so myself!).
Steve, I think this is pretty interesting. It's hard to quantify, though, without your level of experience in setup and management. Would you have a couple of examples we could see of what a typical setup might net out over a year, including the capital investment?
I can give you MSRP on most of the components you'd need but the prices can vary widely depending to the telescope and camera. Let's consider a setup such as LB-0003 as a starting point. A Paramount ME is $14,500. A 12.5" RCOS Ritchey-Chretien will cost $21,500 for just the telescope (a good refractor is going to run you anywhere from $4,000-$10,000). An instrument rotator, field flattener corrector, and telescope command center will run another $7,000. An Apogee Alta U16M with a 7-position filter wheel will cost approximately $13,000-$14,000 with 50mm LRGB, Ha, SII, and OIII filters costing about $4,000. The guiding system (OAG and camera) will cost about $2,500. A decent PC to run the telescope is around $1,000-$1,500. And, you're probably looking at $1,000-$2,000 in software as well. This would put the capital equipment costs in the $65,000-$70,000 range for a 12.5" RC-based observatory. You can take somewhere in the neighborhood of $20,000 off the price if you went with a refractor.
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2: Posted September 10, 2009, 12:10 am by sgcullen
There's no doubt that there is some investment involved, but I wanted to at least give folks the opportunity to recoup some of the expense. This really is something that none of the other telescope hosting facilities can offer. We'll see how it goes. To put your message in perspective, $40K would buy about 800 hours of time on the .61m RC (LB-0001) at $50/hour...that's about 1/4 of the available hours per year...so, you're right, it would buy a lot of telescope time on LightBuckets (something to consider for folks who are thinking about buying their own rigs...LightBuckets is a pretty good deal if I do say so myself!).
3: Posted October 3, 2009, 5:30 pm by Tuiliq
Steve, I think this is pretty interesting. It's hard to quantify, though, without your level of experience in setup and management. Would you have a couple of examples we could see of what a typical setup might net out over a year, including the capital investment?
4: Posted October 4, 2009, 8:55 am by sgcullen
I can give you MSRP on most of the components you'd need but the prices can vary widely depending to the telescope and camera. Let's consider a setup such as LB-0003 as a starting point. A Paramount ME is $14,500. A 12.5" RCOS Ritchey-Chretien will cost $21,500 for just the telescope (a good refractor is going to run you anywhere from $4,000-$10,000). An instrument rotator, field flattener corrector, and telescope command center will run another $7,000. An Apogee Alta U16M with a 7-position filter wheel will cost approximately $13,000-$14,000 with 50mm LRGB, Ha, SII, and OIII filters costing about $4,000. The guiding system (OAG and camera) will cost about $2,500. A decent PC to run the telescope is around $1,000-$1,500. And, you're probably looking at $1,000-$2,000 in software as well. This would put the capital equipment costs in the $65,000-$70,000 range for a 12.5" RC-based observatory. You can take somewhere in the neighborhood of $20,000 off the price if you went with a refractor.
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Sounds intriguing, but it looks like the initial capital investment is probably going to be fairly steep, $40,000.00 for a modest system(RC Optical systems 12" with mount/cameras/filters/software etc.). 40k (plus $1,750/month) buys a lot of time at LightBuckets and other "scopes for rent" sites. However, I do like the idea of getting a return on the investment.