Baader 'Cool Ceramic' Herschel Wedge

[Stu]

I've lusted after one of these for quite a long time, whilst enjoying the views through my 1.25" Lunt wedge. The opportunity to make a bit of a saving in the FLO clearance pushed me over the edge, and it arrived today, beautifully packaged as always.

Despite not being a cheap item, I was still pleasantly surprised by the nice little case which it is supplied in, very solid and well made. It came with comprehensive instructions, plus the two filters (Continuum and ND3.0) which were pre-fitted (not sure if this is standard or because this was an ex demo unit). I did just check they were there, just to be sure. The original Baader filter cases were included still.

The unit itself feels very solidly made, and it's nice to have the 2" clicklock fitting as standard.

The weather has been pretty grotty for the last couple of days, but a clear spell later on gave me a chance for a quick first light at around 4 ish I guess. The sun was still reasonably high but there were patchy clouds scudding past quite regularly.

Well, I don't know if it was shiny new kit syndrome, but the views were the best I have had in white light. I'd like to do a side by side with the Lunt to prove this properly, and will try to report back in this thread when I get a chance but I do genuinely believe they were a noticeable step up in performance.

I was using a 12.5mm eyepiece, plus the Leica zoom, and the granulation was superb. The image seemed brighter than with the 1.25" Lunt, and the faculae stood out more vividly than I remember seeing before, it really was quite extensive. Detail in the active regions was also enhanced I thought, with the fine structures in the penumbra visible despite relatively small AR's currently. I must start sketching again, haven't done any for a long time.

On a practical note, the translucent tile on the back works very well to help in finding the sun, a handy feature.

I ended the session rather hurriedly as a hail and thunderstorm headed my way; just got packed away in time.

I'll report back with the Lunt comparison soon (hopefully not eating humble pie

[russ.will]

It's always difficult to post a definitive first solar light, especially if the first day you luck into is a really good one and showers do a lot to keep the air clear and ground temperatures down.

I sold my 1.25" Lunt as it was shown a clean pair of heals in detail terms by an 8" full aperture Baader Solar Film filter. That statement has to be read in the light of an 80mm scope versus a 200mm one. Contrast was marginally better in the 80ED/Lunt combo, but angular resolution rules and it was an apples v oranges comparison.

Now I have a 100mm ED scope with a mount that tracks at solar rate (and can use The Sun as the alignment star) I'm interested to hear your back-to-back comparison of the two wedges. The fact that the Baader is Click-Lock has always appealed, as I always found I had to take care with the Lunt to get EPs to seat square.

Russell

[Stu]

Very true about being careful not to leap to conclusions on the basis of one session. I think however I've got enough experience of good and bad days with the Lunt to be able to judge the seeing conditions so I'm still confident that the performance is good.

I'm surprised to be be honest that you found the 8"/film combination better than a wedge. I know it has the resolution advantage but also it needs excellent seeing conditions to get the best out of it.

Will report back

[jetstream]

Congrats Stu! these wedges give excellent views and your finding doesn't surprise me at all, Baader's prisms seem top notch. I can't wait to here how high your mag can go on the grans with it!

[LukeSkywatcher]

I had been wondering about the purpose of the tile on the back. Now i know. It would be interesting to see side by side comparison images of the same area on the surface. Congrats on what sounds like a great piece of kit. Bit pricey for my wallet.

[YKSE]

Congratulations Stu, I'm sure you'll find the Baader wedge very price-worthy as I do   Looking forwards to your further reviews.

[Piero]

Nice writing and interesting findings, Stu! I am always surprised by the fine details provided by my lunt. I believe the baader delivers a noticeable step up. Which telescope did you use? I look forward to reading about a side by side comparison between the two!

Searching for the sun with the Lunt can be dead easy if you just put the Lunt on without eyepiece and search more brightness. It takes me a couple of seconds and don't need any 'solar finder'. Just a comment for those who are reading and are not aware of this.

[Stu]

Well, the sun is out this morning, and I've managed a reasonable side by side comparison between the Lunt 1.25" and the Baader.

All I can say is that I stand by my comments from yesterday, with bells on!!

[Piero]

Excellent report, Stu! Nice comparison and also very interesting to read about the test at high power. 

The Baader wedge must be a lovely piece of kit! 

I also find floaters to be an issue at 0.6mm if watching the Sun. I cannot imagine at 0.4mm! 

Thanks for sharing your results

Piero

[Davey-T]

Congratulations Stu, I was very tempted by this but as you know I've already splurged a bit on astro kit recently so glad it's gone to a good home

Hope this weather clears up soon to get some extended use, spent yesterday dodging in and between the showers, looks the same today.

Dave

[Moonshane]

Curse you Davis! 

[Stu]

Curse you Davis!

Tee hee!! Had to do something to wake you up over there Shane

[Stu]

Just caught some glimpses of the AR (not sure of number) just disappearing over the limb. This morning it was more easily seen with a little detail, or at least she umbra/penumbra visibly different. This afternoon in a gap in the cloud it had all but disappeared, just a tiny hint of a line against the edge of the limb, with nice faculae still surrounding it.

Stu

[Moonshane]

Tee hee!! Had to do something to wake you up over there Shane Well it's clouded over here so that serves me right at least

been up to my elbows in rotten wood in my camper for the last couple of weeks or so. still a lot of work to do but will be worth it in the end.

looking forward to doing some solar again myself.

[Stu]

Oh dear, were you expecting the rotten wood or was it a nasty surprise?

[Luke]

Congrats, Stu! Glad to see it went to a good home. Interesting read on the shootout, thank you for taking the time to do this

I will always remember my first high power view with the Baader wedge. I couldn't believe how detailed the view was.

[Stu]

Congrats, Stu! Glad to see it went to a good home. Interesting read on the shootout, thank you for taking the time to do this

 

I will always remember my first high power view with the Baader wedge. I couldn't believe how detailed the view was.

Thanks Luke. I knew you had a Baader but thought you had a Lunt 1.25" too, no?

I'm so glad I grabbed it to be honest. I assumed it would be better, but I'm surprised just how good it is. The high power views are wicked

I'm re acquiring a 120ED shortly, should never have let the last one go but there you are. Still have the Moonlite to pop straight on it. I reckon the Baader in the 120ED and the Quark in the Tak will be pretty hard to beat. All tracking nicely on the AZEQ6, happy days :)

[Stu]

By the way, apologies for the lack of paragraphs in my posts. I think this is a Tapatalk thing! I put them in but they don't appear, I have to open them for editing in the web view then just save again and all the paras appear. Weird!

[Vox45]

Despite not being a cheap item, I was still pleasantly surprised by the nice little case which it is supplied in, very solid and well made. It came with comprehensive instructions, plus the two filters (Continuum and ND3.0) which were pre-fitted (not sure if this is standard or because this was an ex demo unit). I did just check they were there, just to be sure. The original Baader filter cases were included still.

According to FLO website:

"Uses precision 2" Zeiss wedge prism and incorporates a permanently pre-installed ND=3.0 filter in the wedge housing."

and then

Photographic P

The Version-P for photographic use is essentially the Version-V with three additional Baader ND filters (ND1.8, ND0.9 and ND0.6). The additional filters are handy for further dimming the image for white light viewing, or attaching to eyepieces or a T2-15 Reducer, and are particularly useful for imaging.

so not sure if this is the continuum you are talking about ... Were you able to get more info on this filter ?

[Luke]

Yes, you are right, Stu, I do have both! I can't remember if I have done a shoot out between them, so it was handy to see how it fared for you.

I tend to use the Lunt a lot in my ED100 because I am too lazy to keep swapping the ND filters in my Baader between visual and photographic only (must not of course be used for visual!) and tend to keep the Baader set up for imaging. If the Sun is showing off then I sometimes find some energy to swap the filter over

The other slight hassle with the Baader is that the light path is quite long (no idea how it compares against the Lunt 2 inch). That can be an issue for using a binoviewer (that is how I ended up at very high mag, using a bit more Barlow than originally intended to push the focus out! You can get an adapter to help shorten the path, but then you aren't using that gorgeous clicklock). And for imaging you might not be able to do prime focus unless you replace the clicklock with an adapter. That is a double pain because if you then want to do Barlow shots, you have to put the clicklock back on.

The adapters sounded very flexible but I tend to get lazy and just use the Lunt sometimes. But your results I think will encourage me to use the Baader more for visual than I have been doing of late and to try ramping up the mag again.

Thanks Luke. I knew you had a Baader but thought you had a Lunt 1.25" too, no? I'm so glad I grabbed it to be honest. I assumed it would be better, but I'm surprised just how good it is. The high power views are wicked I'm re acquiring a 120ED shortly, should never have let the last one go but there you are. Still have the Moonlite to pop straight on it. I reckon the Baader in the 120ED and the Quark in the Tak will be pretty hard to beat. All tracking nicely on the AZEQ6, happy days :)

[Moonshane]

Thanks guys for making me add yet another flippin' widget to my ever expanding list! 

[Stu]

Yes, you are right, Stu, I do have both! I can't remember if I have done a shoot out between them, so it was handy to see how it fared for you.

I tend to use the Lunt a lot in my ED100 because I am too lazy to keep swapping the ND filters in my Baader between visual and photographic only (must not of course be used for visual!) and tend to keep the Baader set up for imaging. If the Sun is showing off then I sometimes find some energy to swap the filter over

The other slight hassle with the Baader is that the light path is quite long (no idea how it compares against the Lunt 2 inch). That can be an issue for using a binoviewer (that is how I ended up at very high mag, using a bit more Barlow than originally intended to push the focus out! You can get an adapter to help shorten the path, but then you aren't using that gorgeous clicklock). And for imaging you might not be able to do prime focus unless you replace the clicklock with an adapter. That is a double pain because if you then want to do Barlow shots, you have to put the clicklock back on.

The adapters sounded very flexible but I tend to get lazy and just use the Lunt sometimes. But your results I think will encourage me to use the Baader more for visual than I have been doing of late and to try ramping up the mag again.

Seeing is not so good today. I'm glad I did the comparison yesterday because I suspect there would not be so much difference today. I guess it's a case of the Baader being able to stretch its legs more when the seeing allows.

Luke, one advantage of the Taks is that they tend to have shorter tubes, and more in focus available, I guess because they are more imaging biased? This can be a pain in that you sometimes need extension tubes to get visual focus but has its benefits with something like the Baader.

On the 76 today, I'm using the Quark and have managed to fit a Denk powers witch onto the prism. I've now got thee power levels ie Reduced, Standard and Barlowed all available at the slide of a lever and a quick refocus. The reducer gives me just about full disk views in the 76mm which is very nice. Standard is very crisp and the Barlowed view useful for prom detail although the seeing is not up to it today. Not entirely sure what multiplying factors they are giving though.

Imaging schmimaging , look through the blooming thing on a good day, it's quite spectacular! [emoji6][emoji6]

[Stu]

According to FLO website:

"Uses precision 2" Zeiss wedge prism and incorporates a permanently pre-installed ND=3.0 filter in the wedge housing."

and then

Photographic P

The Version-P for photographic use is essentially the Version-V with three additional Baader ND filters (ND1.8, ND0.9 and ND0.6). The additional filters are handy for further dimming the image for white light viewing, or attaching to eyepieces or a T2-15 Reducer, and are particularly useful for imaging.

so not sure if this is the continuum you are talking about ... Were you able to get more info on this filter ?

Hi,

Sorry, yes the Continuum filter is the Baader unit which is also sold separately. I use a 1.25" one with my Lunt.

It is basically a narrowband filter with a peak bandpass at 540nm. It turns the sun green which takes some getting used to (I don't notice any more!), but it does bring out the detail and granulation very nicely.

http://www.firstlightoptics.com/solar-filters/baader-solar-continuum-filter.html

Must be used with the ND3.0 filter though, not as a replacement. Both were pre-fitted in my wedge, with the continuum closer to the scope, and the ND3.0 behind it, nearer the eyepiece. This apparently helps to reduce reflections. Always check if you are unsure about any of this though.

Stu

[Stu]

Thanks guys for making me add yet another flippin' widget to my ever expanding list!

Sorry [emoji26]

It's not that good really, I don't know what I was talking about, just got carried away........ Does that help [emoji6][emoji6]

[Davey-T]

Sorry [emoji26]

It's not that good really, I don't know what I was talking about, just got carried away........ Does that help [emoji6][emoji6]

NO, because if I hadn't just bought the Leica zoom which I still can't use without yet more adapters   I'd have jumped to the buy button as soon as I saw it 

Dave