[albert]

Hello to everyone,

here are some pictures of the very first planetarium projector ever built. The Munich Instrument at the Deutsches Museum in Munich, Germany. It was built at the request of Oscar von Miller, the museum's founder. It has survived the war and is on static display. Unfortunately there are a lot of reflections from the glass panes but I will try to get better shots.

this is the starball...note the small projectors for constellation names (I think)

Albert
 starball_munich.jpg ( 65.35k ) Number of downloads: 1

[albert]

This is a poor shot of the entire machine...I'll get a polarizer next time to get rid of the reflections.

 Munich_instrument.jpg ( 66.94k ) Number of downloads: 0

[albert]

The planet cage. If you look closely, you might see the pantograph mechanism used for the planet projectors.

 planet_cage_Munich.jpg ( 64.11k ) Number of downloads: 0

[Owen Phairis]

Hello to everyone,

here are some pictures of the very first planetarium projector ever built. The Munich Instrument at the Deutsches Museum in Munich, Germany. It was built at the request of Oscar von Miller, the museum's founder. It has survived the war and is on static display. Unfortunately there are a lot of reflections from the glass panes but I will try to get better shots.

this is the starball...note the small projectors for constellation names (I think)

Albert
 starball_munich.jpg ( 65.35k ) Number of downloads: 1

Thanks Albert for posting these great pictures and for the correspondence. In my research I have only been able to find a few pictures of this great projector and none as good as your first post. Thank goodness, it was not destroyed during the war and people knew and cared enough to preserve it for future generations to study and enjoy.

Owen

[Ron Walker]

The planet cage. If you look closely, you might see the pantograph mechanism used for the planet projectors.

 planet_cage_Munich.jpg ( 64.11k ) Number of downloads: 0

I tried to "open" the picture up a little, but your right about a polarizer. Also if you could get some more detailed close ups of each individual projector mechanism would be appreciated.

 Zeiss_one_planet_cage_adj.JPG ( 36.6k ) Number of downloads: 1


Since the projectors for the stars are basically the same on the Model I and Model II, I wonder if they are basically the same distance from the center point. The Mark II has larger star globes because the projectors are located totally within the globe, while the Mark I projectors are mounted on the outside of the globe. The light source increased five times in wattage and using a larger star globe would help with the extra heat dissipation.The original machine had a 50cm globe and I imagine it is the globe the star projectors are mounted on. The Mark II star balls are 75cm in diameter. Since the actual star projector units are now mounted within the shell, one can assume the star projectors to be about 12.5 cm long. Since the focal length of the Mark II projectors is 115mm (11.5cm) these assumptions would appear to hold.

[Ron Walker]

Here is the best picture of the Mark I planet cage I have ever found.

 Zeiss_one_planet_cage.JPG ( 78.35k ) Number of downloads: 1