With a passion for astronomy from a very young age, Dang Hoang San from Hue City has created telescopes himself as well as established a club of people who love the branch of science.

The 10^th grader from Quoc Hoc – Hue High School for the Gifted is now the chairman of the Hue Astronomy Club which gathers every weekend to share their love of the sky.

In 7^th grade, San started studying how to make a microscope and achieved his first victory when he successfully created one which worked like microscopes at his school.

After the debut, San nurtured his passion for science and then used the Internet as his source of knowledge of physics and astronomy.

Dang Hoang San and his self-made telescopes (Photo: Tuoi Tre)

Since he wanted to share what he knew with people, San established the Hue Astronomy Club with 10 initial members at the beginning of 2013.

To save money for the club by not buying expensive telescopes, the young man decided to make them by himself and spent around half a year researching many kinds of telescopes from around the world, as well as home-made tools in Viet Nam.

After mulling things over, San began making his own telescope with simple materials like wood, PVC and iron and finished a reflector after three months.

San’s works have stunned many people, though many of them earlier doubted the student after seeing pictures of the moon he took through the lens of his reflecting telescope.

According to San, a telescope he created costs only VND 2.5 million (US$117) while a normal device with the same focal length and aperture that produces the same quality of image fetches more than VND8 million ($373).

According to Dr. Dinh Van Trung, an astronomer, telescopes with a large diameter that generate high quality images like San’s are quite rare in Viet Nam.

After building his first successful telescope, San then shared his knowledge with the club members, and since then 12 telescopes, including refracting devices, reflectors and spectroscopes, have been created.

San’s club has almost 300 astronomy-loving members, mainly local students, after a few years of operation.

San also often shares what he has learned on his Facebook page, as well as answers questions related to the science branch.