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Do you do/like solar observing??

Carl

By Carl
in Observing - Solar

Do you do/like Solar observing?  

25 members have voted

  1. 1. Do you do/like Solar observing?

    • Yes i like it
      13
    • No i don`t like it
      0
    • I do like it But i can`t be bothered to do it
      1
    • Sometimes i do
      3
    • I`d like to do it BUT i`ve not got the right equipment
      7
    • I`d like to do it.BUT i`m scared in case my solar filter does not work properly
      1

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Carl

Carl

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Hi all

I`ve added to new answers up.And i do do :sunny: :clouds2: ............................................................... sometimes :clouds2:

Because i`m using one of those white filters.And it ain`t very exciting cause you/i can`t see much activitey :clouds2: just sunspots :clouds2:

Worth :sunny: :clouds2: though cause the :sunny:`s facinating.

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Carl

Carl

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Been observing the starry night for over 20yrs now and never viewed our sun so i mayy get the courage whilst imaging our friend.

:clouds2: :shock: :clouds2:How could you NOT view the life giver.The parent of all parents.I`m very disserpointed in you James :nono: :x

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OXO

OXO

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Don't mind you asking mate, i get really nervous when doing solar projetion to the point i am shaking, as to solar filters ie baader i am uneasy if i should trust it or not hence imaging only with it.... I have the feeling i would feel differant if someone had there scope setup with baader filter and was observing with it and i was around to see it, this may promt me too take a peek after which i prob wouldnt ave a problem with it..

Sounds silly i know but ya cant help feeling the way you do can ya :?

James

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Jamie

Jamie

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Sorry mate i should have elaborated.

I used a Mylar solar filter (white light)

This was a special occasion it was October 28th 2003 during unusual solar activity.

We were bombarded by X class solar flares during this period which also gave us some

great Aurora to see.

Image was taken through an 8" reflector with a solar filtered hartman mask.

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FLO

FLO

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I think that unless you have the use of an HA solar filtered scope

like the Coronado then you would loose interest in solar observing

quite quickly.

That about sums it up for me too.  Although, I did use a white-light filter on an ETX-105 (4" Mak') at a family get-together to show the kids sunspots 8)

Saw thru a Coronado PST Hydrogen-Alpha scope last summer (thanks BC&F) and viewed a large solar prominence :clouds2:

... Would really like to see the Suns rice-pudding-surface!

Steve

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Astroman

Astroman

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I view the Sun at just about every chance I get! Saying, "there's only sunspots" is like saying "there's only the Grand Canyon"!! Like every other observed object, the more you look, the more you'll see. Once you know how to observe the Sun, the better it is.

Example 1) White light filters.

There are many types and colors. First, the popular "Mylar" or Baader Film filters. These are thin film filters and generally show the Sun in a bluish-whitish tint. This is actually a more natural color of the Sun. Being classified as a GIIV, the Sun's color is really more like bright clouds than yellow, since the blue light is dispersed by the atmosphere. These filters let in the most light, which makes them great for photography. If you have one of these white filters, you can place a yellow or orange filer in the eyepiece to increase contrast. Try all colored filters you have, too. Each one will bring out different details, allowing you to see more features on the Sun, (of which there are several, and I'll describr them later.)

Thousand Oaks Full aperture Glass type II.

This is one of the white light filters I have. (The pictures of the Sun on my website were mostly taken through this filter) It gives the Sun a yellow/orange color, more what we think the Sun looks like. It's great for wide viewing, since it gives high contrast, but cuts too much light to work well for high power or photography. Even so, I've got some pretty good pictures through mine.

Orion Full Aperture glass filter.

This one is kind of a pinkish yellow filter. It's an odd color, but it lets in more light than the 1K Oaks, so it's brighter. More for smaller apertures, such as for the ETX series and small (6") newts, it holds up to higher powers in those scopaes.. I Haven't tried photos through one, but I'd think they'd turn out well.

Hydrogen Alpha filters.

These can be extremely expensive and finicky to use, but if you get a chance to use one, definitely do so. These allow you to see the hot, faint solar prominences at the edges of the Sun and filaments across the face, among other things. The aforementioned PST, (Coronado's Personal Solar Telescope) is a relaitely cheep ($500US) investment and is nearly idiot proof. It come in all one piece, faactory collimated and includes a no brains needed finder scope. Fair to good images at a down to Earth price.

More expensive HA filters include the Coronado line. They come in sizes from 40mm to 90mm and cost from $1200 to $5000US +. I had one at the Grand Canyon Star Party this year, attached to my $80 Meade 80mm refractor. $3000 filter on a $80 scope. Gave AMAZING views!

Right now is not a particularly good time to start observing the Sun, BTW. The Solar Maximum was observed about 3 years ago, and the Sun is currently on the downward swing in activity. It will bounce up and down in sunspots for the next few years, but mostly down. You have to check regularly than, to see in anything is happening or you'll miss it. Spots will not be as large as in the past few years, and thus will not last as long.

That said, what to look for on the Sun:

In white light, using the FULL APERTURE filters above, (it's the only way to be safe) you'll first notice sunspots-darker regions of cooler plasma across the face. Look carefully at the sunspot itself. You can see that the center of a large spot will appear nearly black, while the area just around it appears mottled. The center area is the Umbra, the mottling is the Penumbra-just like in an eclipse. The umbra is an area of very high magnetic flux, which cools the plasma and makes it appear dark. The penumbra is light, because the magnetic filed lines are not as dense, therefore some of the hotter plasma is visible around or under it. Sometimes, hot plasma flows along the magnetic field lines above the umbra, allowing you to see bright plasma or "light bridges" overe the spot.

Next, look closely at the umbra itself. If the seeing is good, and your filter stands up to high power, you can pick out details in the penumbra. Small filaments of mottled plasma of different temperatures look like fur from a grey fox or tabby cat. The patterns seen in the penumbra closely trace the magnetic lines that create the spot.

Next, look closely just outside the penumbra. This is where the heat goes, being deflected from the sunspot. You can see bright, mottled areas here. These will be the bright "plages", (with a long A as in Father). When plages are near the edge, or limb of the Sun, they show the "orange peel" effect the best. These are the cells or "granularity" that everyone wants to see. They're subtle in white light and very dependant on seeing. Bubbling clumps of plasma, they're on the order of a few hundred miles wide at the largest. It takes practice to see them, and this is one of the times colored filters may help. Plages are what you want to look for when the SAun doesn't show any big sunspots. These will be areas to keep an eye on for future activity. They are given "active region" numbers by the Mount Wilson observatory, many times before a visible sunspot evolves.

While carefully watching sunspots, you can see them change structure on a time frame close to watching clouds develope. They don't appear to move much in real time, but glimpsed over a few minutes, they show remarkable changes!

In Hydrogen alpha, some other features appear. First off, prominences. These are huge plumes of plasma leaping off the edge of the Sun. Since they glow hotter than the surface, the ionized hydrogen atoms must be singled out to see them. Otherwise, they are lost in the white light of the photosphere. Once seen though, I can't help trying to gauge their sizes. Figuring the Sun is 863,000 miles across, and our Earth is only 8,300 miles or so, you could string 109 Earths across the equator of the Sun. Picture this anytime you observe "small" sunspots or prominences. Anyway, prominences will be seen first.

Look next for dark "whisps" of cloud-like features across the face. These are "filaments" and are simply prominences when seen from the top. Sometimes, they last long enough to rotate to the edge and appear as prominences, but not often. They are dark only when compared to the surface.

Around sunspots, you can see large areas of disturbed plasma. These will sometimes brighten into flares. These flares can become coronal mass ejections, (CME) if sufficiently violent, and cause the aurora someone mentioned before.

Looking at the Sun in H-Alpha makes it easy to see Supergranulation. The orange-peel effect noticed earlier, but on a much larger scale. The super cells lie below the white light granularity and heat it by convection. Think of them as big bubbles at the bottom of boiling porridge. Supercells are hundreds to thousands of miles across, some reaching continent-sized clumps.

At the edges of the Sun in HA, crank up the power to see small, grass-like filaments called "spicules". These are the "moss" someone mentioned before, and are the interface between the chromosphere and the corona. They consist of hot plasma following magnetic field lines once again, but on a small scale that allows interesting, not well understood physics to heat the corona higher than the "surface". (A better explanation of this process is in Pasachoff's book, Nearest Star.)

Well, that about covers observing the Sun, although some things I've left out.

I observed the Sun today in fact, with my 5" F/14 solar scope I built myself. I'll upload a picture of it shortly, alonf with a solar picture that turned out reasonably well.

If you want to see some other solar pics I took, you can check my website under "Astrophotos-Solar".

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