Littleguy80

Aah interesting. I didn’t know you’d had that issue with try DeLite, Iain. It has been going through my mind that it may be some odd issue of the Pentax with this scope. I may well drop Telescope House an email to see about the cleaning service.

I just tried that experiment on the Moon and didn’t spot anything. I’ll try again against the light sky in the morning to see if I can spot anything. Certainly nice and sharp on the Moon.

Although just tried the Pentax in my 80mm refractor using the same diagonal that I used with the Daystar and can’t see any specs of dirt when looking at a clear sky. I wonder if it’s some sort of internal reflection or something going on. It’s a prism diagonal I’m using. I can’t think that would make a difference.

It says the effective focal length is 936 so that would make it F15.6. I’m convinced it’s dirt on the eyepieces now. I hadn’t checked the bottom lens on the Baader zoom and that had a couple if obvious specks of dirt on it which cleaned off easily. I’ll confirm that’s ok tomorrow. The Pentax XF, I can definitely see one black dot when looking through the EP onto a white background. I’m fairly convinced it’s on an internal lens though. Are there places that would do EP cleaning in terms of taking it apart to clean internal lens. This is another recent secondhand purchase so no retailer to go back to

It’s much more noticeable in the Pentax XF vs Baader Zoom. I tried a TV Plossl 25mm and couldn’t see them in that so gut feel is it’s dirty eyepieces. Just held the Pentax over a white piece of paper and could see a spec of dirt. I fear it may be one of the internal lenses though. Would explain why my cleaning efforts have failed.

Two different zooms both at 20mm. They don’t move position as a look around so I’m sure they’re not floaters. It’s very odd.

I have a Daystar SS60 which gives lovely views but has an odd issue where I can see a pair of black dots which appear to sit on top of the image. If I rotate the eyepiece the dots move while the image below remains static. I can see them in two different eyepieces though they are more noticeable in one eyepiece. I've removed the diagonal and inserted the eyepiece directly and can still see them. I've cleaned everything I can think to clean! Does this indicate some kind of internal fault in the scope/quark? I bought this second hand so don't have warranty to fall back on. Any thoughts on possible causes? It's driving me crazy!

Are fast novas less likely to brighten again?

Thanks Jeremy

@JeremyS How and when would this get an official designation? There are people on here who like to record such things in spreadsheets 😁

Haha I often do that. It’s that feeling of “I’m looking right at it but which one is it?” 😂

Got it with my 80mm refractor using a 40mm eyepiece at 12.5x. It’s brighter than HD176441 (Mag 7.1). I’d guess it’s around 6.8-6.9. FF Aql is a great reference point. Massive thanks to @JeremyS and @Pixies for the heads up and charts to find this. Very chuffed to get another Nova.

May have a chance to observe this tonight if I can figure whereabouts in Hercules to look!

Whatever else happens, I’ve at least seen it

Forecast is good enough that I’m heading over to the observatory to join some friends from my local astro society. Just hope I haven’t forgotten anything…

Thought I’d add my entry into the nova magnitude estimating game. Looking at it in the dob, it looks a smidge dimmer than HD220819 which SkySafari lists at 6.6. I’ll put my estimate at 6.7. Now I just have to wait for the official number to see if I have a chance of winning a prize Really lovely skies this evening. M52 is a treat in the same FOV.

Treated myself to a second tripod so I can have both WL and HA on the go. Being in Norfolk I have some hope of seeing this tomorrow. Either way, pleased with this setup.

Forecasts are so changeable and with solar it only takes a small break in the cloud. I booked the day off for the Mercury transit in 2019. Solid cloud all morning with forecast not looking favourable. As the transit was beginning it looked on the satellite images as though there may be some clear patches nearby so I drove about 30 mins and then pulled over on the side of the road when the skies cleared. Got a look and took a picture or two. My wife then messaged to say it was clearing out at home. Drove home and sure enough the skies cleared and stayed clear all afternoon. Had the best time. Similar to you, Paul, my purchase of the Herschel Wedge was mainly to see that event. I’ve had a lot of fun with it since and have been quite an avid solar observer. On the last Lunar eclipse it was really cloudy here. I only got a 2 min break in the clouds towards the end of it. That was enough for a quick view and picture. I tend to go with that attitude for these things. If I get a quick look then I’m happy. Anything beyond that is a bonus. Generally the weather has been very kind to me. The conjunction of Jupiter and Saturn was a similar story. I sat patiently staring at clouds and was rewarded when things cleared out for a little bit.

Thanks Roy. I actually read your first light report with the SS60 the night before I bought it. That definitely helped with making the decision to buy it when it popped up on ABS. Interesting on the aperture mask. What did you use to make yours? Thanks for the comments on the Solarquest too. It seems like a lot but there must be something to it with three recommendations now!

Thanks John. I haven’t thought about that yet. I’ve been getting on well with the manual mount so far but maybe something to consider if one comes up secondhand for a good price.

I've been enjoying white light solar observing for a couple of years now. HA observing is something that interested me but seemed quite pricey to get into. In April, a Daystar Solar Scout 60mm came up on ABS for £375 so I jumped in. Apparently 4 other people emailed about it after me so lady luck was smiling on me that day. I already had an 8Ah Tracer Battery which I use to run the dew heaters for my Dob. My existing Altair Mini-Az mount on a Three Legged Thing Billy tripod are ideal for the little HA scope. The first eyepiece I used was a 25mm TV Plossl which gave excellent views. The only thing I disliked was the long eye relief. I suspect this was more apparent due to the barlow built into the scope. From my first views, with the tuner set at the midpoint, I could see a number of proms quite easily and lots of granulation on the surface. My Baader Hyperion Zoom then became my preferred eyepiece with the 12mm setting seeming to be the maximum the scope would support before the image quality broke down. The twisting focuser the scope is ok but it definitely feels tricky to find the optimal focus point. At this point I want to give a shout out to @johninderby. John has unknowingly provided much of the inspiration for this setup. My TS Optics Herschel Wedge was bought from John so in many ways he started me off on my solar journey. I added a clip to support the battery on the tripod along with a coiled cable. These ideas were stolen from John's excellent review on this scope. I also purchased a Pentax XF zoom based on John's and a couple of other members recommendations. The Pentax had proved a great eyepiece for both White Light and Ha observing. It's a definite step up in contrast from the Baader zoom. With the Baader zoom, I used a single polarising filter to help improve contrast, I haven't found I needed this with the Pentax. In terms of surface detail, with some methodical adjustment of the tuning, I've gotten some really good results. It has to be said that I don't have a basis for comparison but what I can see compares well with the images on GONG. The Pentax tops out around 10-11mm before the image quality degrades. This gives a maximum magnification of around 85x, with excellent seeing this may go a little higher. On this point, I'm uncertain whether I should be expecting more magnification from a 60mm HA scope. Today, the case for the scope arrived, so I've had a happy morning trimming foam for it. Overall, I'm really pleased with this setup. It was a bit of an impulse buy and has added an extra dimension to my solar observing.

Thanks Roy. Sorry to hear you were beaten by the clouds. Fingers crossed it clears out later on for you.

I am not, by nature, an early riser. However, a call from work a little before 6am led to me looking out the window at clear skies. The Sun was now clearing the roof enough to light up the end of the back garden. I wondered if the seeing might be poor with the Sun being low so decided to test the waters with some WL observing. The post lady delivered a Pentax XF Zoom this week. It had a very brief first light in poor conditions. I'd mainly bought it as an H-Alpha eyepiece but decided to test it out in WL too. Using the Equinox 80mm refractor and a TS Optics Herschel Wedge, I got my first views with the zoom. My normal WL eyepiece is a Nagler 3-6mm zoom so the lower power views of the Pentax were immediately quite striking. Really good contrast showing AR2824 off well as one large main spot and some small pores around it. There was really good granulation on display too. I was hugely impressed by the quality of the view. I switched to the Nagler zoom for comparison at the 6mm setting, which is near enough the max setting of the Pentax which goes to 6.5mm. The views were similar with the Pentax having a slight edge in contrast and sharpness to my eye. I then paired the Pentax with a Baader VIP barlow. This combination worked really. I spotted a smaller spot with some nice faculae near limb, another new active region forming perhaps? There was also another region of faculae near the limb on the other side. My youngest daughter, 6 years old, joined me and started to produce various toy food items and drinks for me. I had a good make believe breakfast and several make believe cups of teas! It was time to switch to Ha observing now. I replaced the Equinox 80 with a Daystar Solar Scout 60mm. While it warmed up, I went inside to make a real cup of tea as the make believe ones, whilst delicious, hadn't quite hit the mark. Prior to the arrival of the Pentax zoom, I'd been using a Baader Hyperion Zoom with the SS60. I have a 25mm TV plossl which gives great views but I disliked the long eye relief when using it with the SS60. I think the eye relief is coming from the barlow built into the SS60. The first views with the Pentax showed some improvement in contrast but more noticeably sharpness over the Baader zoom. I began methodically adjusting the tuning and was really pleased to see contrast noticeably improve as I found the right setting for the Pentax. The SS60 is my first Ha scope so it's difficult to judge quality but I was really impressed with what I could see. Numerous proms, tons of granulation and some really impressive detail in the AR. I found I was reaching somewhere around 10-11mm as the upper limit before the views started to worsen with the increased magnification. Around 85x magnification, not sure if this is about right for a 60mm Ha scope? The views compared favourably with the images on GONG so I was really pleased with all that I could see. Hazy cloud arrived and brought the morning's fun to an end. The early wake up call was well worth it to have such an enjoyable solar session. My setup from this morning, note the hot dogs ketchup and mustard

Thanks John. Really looking forward to giving it a go.

Pentax XF Zoom for Solar Ha use! I nearly told my wife when I got the solar scope that I wouldn’t need any extra eyepieces for it. Thank goodness I didn’t say anything so foolish!