Rusted

The seeing may have gone off but the 150/1500 produced very inferior surface detail with the Lunt prism compared to the 90mm. The first image is with no D-ERF. The second image is with the D-ERF in place.

Thanks Freddie. I can just as easily use the 150mm 6" f/10 iStar. I'll give that a go. Just a matter of exchanging the PST etalon + filter stack for empty extension tubes. I have used the iStar for lunar without removing the D-ERF and protective UV/IR filters.

Yes, thanks, this is the '174. I was amazed at the detail given the stack of Barlows picked straight from the drawer. It it windy too. So the scopes are moving about more than I like. Is there a 5x Barlow in my stars or another camera better suited to 1000mm f/l?

Hi, I have just added a Lunt 1.25" Herschel Prism to my old Vixen 90mm f/11 for my first, serious, white light images. Solar pores on surface at 1000mm x2 TS GPC + 2x Orion Shorty Barlow + Baader Solar Continuum. V. Pleased with image quality so far but need more amplification! What is the smart money using? AR12773 in B&W and Colour.

Thank you John. Your encouragement is appreciated.

Thank you both. I agree on the B&W detail but some people think B&W is boring.

I had a window of only ten minutes between complete overcasts. [Plural?] Grabbed loads of videos. These are quite similar to yesterday's in detail but softer. Despite being cropped I need to work on more even illumination across the frame.

Additional images processed more and sharpened:

Blowing a gale from the north which may be helping to mix the air. Quite pleased with these.

I was expecting to find "air wedges" beside sky hooks in the same aisle but apparently they do exist. Whatever happened to "universal robots" when you need them most?

I've seen hydrogen peroxide suggested for cleaning mould from dismantled lenses. I wonder whether HP could be infused [in gaseous form] into a still assembled lens if some HP liquid and the lens were sealed into an airtight container? A light vacuum on one side of the lens assembly, to draw in the HP, might help.

That is an amazingly narrow bandwidth! Is this typical of the resolution of the entire instrument?

Very impressive set up, build and results! You can tell that some time [50 years?] has passed since I used four safety, razor blades, four wooden clothes pegs. This was for the slit. Two home made 60mm achromats in cardboard tubes on a triangular wooden frame made me a crude solar spectroscope. I could see hundreds of Fraunhofer lines but not the H-a proms I had hoped for. That took another 50+ years!

Daft idea? If you can remove the objective cell from the main tube you can pop the whole lens and cell into a poly bag of rice. Dry rice is very absorbent and will help to dry out the lens in a well sealed bag. Most objectives cells unscrew from the main tube. I used a rubber strap wrench on my Vixen 90. The cell was incredibly tight! Two rubber strap wrenches used in opposition would have been far, far better. I used a Prusik [spelling?] loop and batten to hold the main tube against turning. You could use two Prusik loops in opposition if you can't find any strap wrenches. [Cheap!] Use no other tools!

Thank you Peter. I'm glad we agree. I have just been trying different screens and monitors. A brighter Gamma setting seems to rob the images of detail. While slightly darker settings emphasise the detail and contrast. I tried a 4K TV, high res laptop, 10" tablet and two 27/28" monitors.

Thank you for the ImPPG settings suggestions. I have saved them as text files for further study. I am always grateful for tips from experts. That said, I treat every single image as unique and have no fixed ImPPG settings. Nor have I ever used Adaptive settings in anger. Not once. I can't even see what Adaptive does to an image. ImPPG is extremely frustrating to use because it often spoils images without really sharpening them. They go very dark and "spotty" in my hands. Without achieving any of the desirable subtlety and realism. I wouldn't be without ImPPG but still have much to learn despite my countless hours of live practice. I continuously process videos to final images and post them on my blog while I am capturing at the telescope. A couple of minutes from capture to posting an image online is all it takes me. It probably shows! My final treatment in simple image handling software [PhotoFiltre] often makes a bigger difference. Histogram, gamma, colour saturation and contrast will often rescue a "weak" image coming from ImPPG. Here are a couple of later examples from yesterday downloaded from my blog. The fine detail was just beginning show live on the monitor in the late afternoon seeing. Rather than only appearing after processing. The first image looks far too "weak" to me on my 28" HD home PC monitor but looks fine on my imaging AOC monitor in the observatory. The second image has extra work in PhotoFiltre to strengthen the filaments and surface detail. I keep thinking I should bring the AOC indoors and put the softer Samsung HD 28" out in the observatory. I'd value your opinion on whether this extra handling is actually an improvement.

We had a bit of cloud at lunch time but otherwise fairly clear. Seeing steadily improving but wind getting worse..

Thanks. The seeing improved slowly through the afternoon. Though I had to choose calm moments in the increasingly gusty wind.

The disturbed region marches onwards across the disk. No obvious spots. I am still experimenting with processing to match the forum's image rendition. All of these are of the same, original capture. Pick 'n' mix.

Well done!

Early mist cleared to sunshine. I have been alternating between PST blocking filter and the Lunt B1200. The limb is busy at about 10 o'clock. NE. Nice prom at 7 o'clock SE but not very high contrast. Needs lots of gain.

I captured a rather insignificant, dark filament in the south and a couple of small, pale spots, including a double further north. The seeing was very poor and the proms weren't bright enough to contrast against the milky sky glare. Too cloudy to benefit from any late afternoon, seeing improvements. I hear there is a spot coming around the limb soon.

The seeing is awful today. The prom refused to be drawn. Caught a dark filament at about 2 o'clock high near the limb:

Bear the weight? A bear is heavy. But, you never see a bare bear.

It seems more than one lens abuser needs some advice: You remove lens elements by lowering the opened cell vertically over a stable, padded support on a clean and stable surface. The objective remains in mid air as the cell is lowered with more care than an actor defusing a "dirty" bomb in the centre of a large city. So your lens support had better be tall enough to allow the cell to reach the table safely while leaving the fragile glass suspended and exposed. A drinking glass, of suitable dimensions, covered in a cloth or tissue, is usually recommended. The protected circular rim avoids tilting on curved elements. Once free of the cell the objective itself may be highly unstable! But, at least you have a glass handy to drown your sorrows when you've just made your precious objective into an utterly worthless, decorative object. The flint is particularly prone to large, scalloped, surface flaking when your hand shakes. Or you lose patience with gravity as the lens clings desperately to its cell. It probably has far more sense than you do at this point! Checking for spacers and marks on the edges of the lens elements should be considered the next vital step. These are often found in almost invisible pencil. So you'll need a good light and/or torch and your best reading glasses. Better have that 5 gallon drum of matt black paint and a four inch brush handy to "tidy up" your newly added, lens surface decoration. Then you can start all over again with the cell surrounding your empty drinking glass ready to be raised around the cleaned objective. I'd get an ad in the Sales and Wants before you even start. Don't forget to mention the huge scallop on the flint! Though you can always cover the lens with gaffer tape. Like one person of doubtful heritage selling a folded 6" refractor on UK Buy/Sell.