Rusted

Here is the Lacerta 2" wedge on my 7" f/12 with the 6" f/8 [H-alpha.] Together on my home made mounting in my home made two storey observatory. A couple of years ago. Larger instruments need very steady seeing to maximise their usefulness. My Vixen 90mm f/11 with Lunt 1.25" wedge can give the illusion of a sharper image. Until I need far more reach [power] to make a small detail visible. Yesterday there were a few small spots on a disturbed area in the far NW. AR12840[?] So I used the 2" Lacerta, ASI174 and 2x Barlow on my 6" f/10 to show it. The seeing was poor so 3m of focal length wasn't going to be razor sharp. The curvature of the solar limb shows the scale of the image. The 7" is waiting to be remounted on a home made cross-axis. under a new dome.

Thanks for the excellent review. I find myself in general agreement. I have had a Lacerta 2" wedge for quite a while and used it on my 7" f/12 iStar refractor. Now occasionally on my 6" f/10. The heat sink gets hot with these larger apertures. Optical quality seems fine. The Brewster Angle is insignificant if you have a camera attached. Not so good visually in high summer with high solar altitudes. The Lacerta rotating adapter system is valuable for a polarizing filter and works really well. The downside is the available, internal depth for multiple filters. The Solar Continuum plus polarizing plus ND. The downside is the darkness when you forget to turn the polarizer to match your brightness needs. You can find yourself winding up the gain in SharpCap until you realise your error. [Probably an age related error when WL isn't a major interest.] The open bottom is valuable for centring the sun. I often tilt the prism so I can see inside when first setting up. The inside of the heat sink gets quite a tan after many hours of tracking the sun. But then many black anodized surfaces do.

It's a "beump" spoken with a Peter Sellers accent. [Pink Panther]

Congratulations. A finder dovetail-bracket?

I have always felt rather small when staring up at the night sky. But at least SGL no longer calls me a "Brown Dwarf!"

Thanks. It's solid cloud here now.

Gusty gales and two layers of cloud. Thunder and cloudbursts forecast! What an optimist! Some excellent disturbed areas to see as AR12835 slides off the edge. Nice prom at 11. o'clock. Clouded out and blown away now so that's your lot!

My 90M on a welded stainless steel tripod and MkIII Fullerscopes mounting. The tripod is far too heavy to lift. So I have to drag it around in short spurts. An early, local eclipse from the top of a hill. Compact camera held to the eyepiece of the 90M on a video tripod. Early morning Venus transit handheld to eyepiece from another hill. Same video tripod. Jupiter through 90M. Am I off topic? Probably. 👴🏻

The seeing supported a 2x Barlow today as I experimented with settings in Autostakkert and ImPPG. Nice light bridge over the umbra.

Outstanding!

My B1200S2 BF is already showing pale blue patches. Purchased from Bresser in March 2020. My wife admits to having the right stuff in the hazardous chemicals cupboard. Please expand on "a quick dip." No rubbing? There is a blob of black silicone sealant securing the filter holder. Won't removing this void any guarantee?

As a general rule it is considered unsafe to leave any telescope unattended in daylight. There is always the risk of a child or even an unlearned adult turning an unprotected 'scope to look at the sun. Much the same could be said for unattended binoculars. A solar scope should be much safer from such "accidents." I used to have my WL 90mm Vixen pointing at the sun for hundreds of hours while I imaged in H-a. I now cap the Vixen. Interestingly[?] my countless hours of solar observing and imaging has given most of the black finished items a definite tan!

Everyone's a critic. I thought most of the images were superb!

HI Chris, It is directly related to the size of the camera's sensor. An everyday example would be MFT [Micro Four Thirds.] Which doubles the image size, for a given focal length, compared with a full frame camera. It is referred to as crop factor. Crop factor - Wikipedia

I cut down a standard T2 - 1.25" nosepiece. So I can fit GPCs between my ZWO camera and the Lunt blocking filter. It might be possible to do the same with a C-mount adapter. Though I am not familiar with them. The female thread length looks too long on most of the adapters I just looked at online. No need for a lathe. Wrap neatly across to the desired length with tape first and then hacksaw at the edge of the tape. File, or sandpaper the end smooth with the medium abrasive paper resting on a flat surface. The start of the newly cut-off thread needs to be clean and smooth to allow something to be screwed into it. Never force it to screw in. Or you may cause permanent damage to both threads! It is vitally important to use a receptacle with a compression band if you shorten any smooth surfaced male fitting adapter. I always drill and thread my compression band adapters for three clamping thumbscrews 120° part.

Lovely image packed with fine detail. I hate to criticise but can I suggest adding a little less colour? The colour itself is wonderful but you are hiding the huge potential of your excellent optical system. I downloaded your image and played around with it. With less colour or even monochrome [B&W] the detail on the solar surface is astonishing!

Hope this helps? Alexandra's Images:

That usually happens when I try to post my .TIFFs instead of my fully processed JPEGs. The forum is only protecting me from myself.

Very crisp! Wouldn't it be fun if eggs really were that shape?

Nice disks! Masses of detail!

You caught the brightness of the flaring around the area near the more obvious spots. Some amazing filaments too.

Just to finish off the day: Here is my last image before the trees took the sun to bed. There were several flares to the north east of AR12835.

Great stuff! Thanks! Give a man a fish...

Thanks. I haven't seen any AR reference to the "scruffy bit" SW of AR12835. In fact I lack a reliable source for such information. I just lip read what they say on the forums and borrow it.

Flaring again from the same area. Use them if you've got 'em.