Home Made Pier Adapter for a Meade 10" LX200 On A Meade Super-Wedge

This pier is seriously heavy duty, way better than any tripod.  It's anchored to a yard of concrete going down 4' into the earth, and is welded from a nearly 10" piece of heavy steel pipe.  Problem is I had to adapt between it and the Super-Wedge.  So I bought an 8" disk of metal thinking I could work it, drill it as needed. Wrong. AR500 steel is very hard to drill.  Read about annealing.  All I had was my barbecue, so that's what I used. Got it to 750F on the barbecue, then used a MAP gas torch to get it up to 1000F, then let it cool slowly. That did the trick, and I could now drill & tap it.  Drilled 5 holes & countersunk them so the screw heads would be below the level surface - to hold the plate to the pier. Then drilled & tapped holes for the three cap-head screws that hold the wedge to the plate, plus one big center hole. After fitting it up, I marked my north line and drilled & tapped 3 more holes, this time in the right place. Also welded the 2 in ch piece of flat steel on for the adjuster pin.  This makes for a nice tough sturdy mount for the telescope, and the ability to north-align as if it were on the tripod.  There's more info on how I made the pier here: http://moleculardispersion.blogspot.c...
By the way, the dog's name is Sirius. Seemed like a good dog name.

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