Left: Start with the rocker box (seen from the top).  Right:  (seen from the bottom) Then remove the ground board (the 17" round 1/2" ply at right) and bolt a square of 1/4" baltic  birch (at left) to the bottom to protect the formica (Ebony Star) from airline baggage handlers.  Brass threaded inserts in the bottom of the rocker box accept 10-32 bolts.  This bottom piece of 1/4" ply is vital to shipping as it gets a lot of heavy abuse and is badly scarred. Also the use of grade 5, or better grade 8 bolts on the bottom is recommended since the shoving of the heavy box on ordinary bolt heads results in removal of the slot for the screwdriver, making removal of the bolts on the other end difficult.

Then the mirror box, with the altitude bearings removed and the collimation   bolts turned all the way in, fits inside of the rocker box.  Notice that there is a  7/8" space on the right.  To decrease the weight of the final box,  I now remove most of the mirror cell seen here and pack the metal into the box for the truss poles.

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Into that 7/8" space fits the altitude bearings.  They are 17" in diameter    which is the same size as the mirror box.  A strip of 1/2" ply (not shown)  fits snugly between the two bearings during shipping.  This eliminates any  flopping around during transport.  Thin foam packing material is placed    between all wood surfaces to cushion the blows of  the baggage handlers.  there was no damage to the scope in transit to and from Australia, other  than a few minor scratches to the rocker box.

The baffle in place.  The baffle provides a platform to rest the UTA on during transport.

The UTA rests on the baffle.    The focuser and secondary mirror are removed for transport.

A dust/dew shield  made of  black foam core is velcroed  onto the UTA.    The dew/light shield, made of  Kydex,  that attaches to the front of the UTA (seen in pictures describing the UTA) is opened and placed around the UTA.

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The top of the rocker box mates exactly  with the bottom since each side was cut from the same original piece of birch. Aluminum rectangles (1/8"x2"x8" - U-FHSA-02/32 on page 97 of catalog 21 obtained from Small Parts) are bolted to both the top and bottom with 10-32 bolts. This securely fastens the two. The 1" strips of 1/16"-thick aluminum angle seen here on the grass,  bolt to the edges of the box to minimize corner damage during transport and to further strengthen the connection between  the top and bottom of the box.    The chest handles are from Woodworker's Supply (call 800-645-9292 for a great catalog that has all kinds of stuff).

All closed up with aluminum angle on  the corners.  The truss tubes go in a  cardboard box (seen below).  The problem encountered is that the weight of the box, as shown, was 72 pounds.  By removing much of the mirror cell during airplane shipping, the weight can be brought down to about 65 pounds.  I  plan to rebuild the top of the box out of 1/4" baltic birch to loose another 5+ pounds.  The top shown is 1/2"-thick on  two sides and 3/4"-thick on two sides,  matching the rocker box itself.

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Strong cardboard , originally from a computer monitor box, was fashioned into a box to comply with airline maximum measurements (sum of WxDxH cannot exceed 62").  The box is 9x9x44 and holds sleeping bag, foam sleeping pad, truss poles, dissassembled travel chair, and, now, much of the disassembled mirror cell.  It is made very strong by wrapping it with string tape.  Not even a baggage handling gorilla could break it.  It transported to and from Australia just fine.  A handle, rescued from another box, makes it easy to pick up. However, nowadays the TSA freaks out with such a box. So I built a new one from 1/4" Baltic Birch (44x8x9) that has clasps and a combo lock that they can open. Hoping to have less problems with this setup. 2011 update: This new box works great having been to Australia, Costa Rica, the Bahamas, and Chile with it.

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