New Solar scope

[trazor]

Looking forward to buying a Solar telescope in the near future, for visual only.

Budget up to around £1500.

Any recommendations, the range to purchase seems limited, or am I missing something.

Thanks for looking..........

[Sam]

Your budget is more than mine was so I got a PST, though I did have an envious look at a Solarmax 2. Good on you for wanting to get into solar observing, it's fantastic.

[A McEwan]

At that level of budget I'd be looking for a good quality used (or possibly new?) Lunt 60mm scope. Preferably pressure tune model, but the standard tuning is still adequate for good views, but with a more noticable sweet spot issue. The Lunt 60 gives good bright views of all h-alpha features and can take reasonably high magnification when seeing allows, to zoom into features for detailed viewing.

Have you done h-alpha obsering before? Would this be your first solar-specific scope?

Ant

[allcart]

I second the Lunt systems. Very well made and looks nice. Second hand Lunts are as rare as hens teeth, but with your budget you could get a basic visual LS60T ha. brand new.

[trazor]

At that level of budget I'd be looking for a good quality used (or possibly new?) Lunt 60mm scope. Preferably pressure tune model, but the standard tuning is still adequate for good views, but with a more noticable sweet spot issue. The Lunt 60 gives good bright views of all h-alpha features and can take reasonably high magnification when seeing allows, to zoom into features for detailed viewing.

Have you done h-alpha observing before? Would this be your first solar-specific scope?

Ant

This would be my first solar specific scope, so no h-alpha observing at all.

Would only be interested in observing, not photography.

Is the pressure tune model noticeably better ??

[A McEwan]

I had a standard tuning model first of all and enjoyed it so much I recommended my club buy one. The "sweet Spot" is an effect where the entire field of view cannot be "on band" or tuned, at the same time. Consequently you have a portion of the view that shows detail better than the rest - the Sweet Spot. PSTs are probably the worst for this, though it does vary from model to model.

I understand it is to do with the way the etalon is constructed and works, so is unavoidable. The Lunt 60 standard tune model is an improvement on the PST in thi regard, and of course has larger aperture and feels more like a "proper telescope".

Lunt later introduced the Pressure Tune model, which I now own. The etalon is constructed differently and uses pressure to tune the bandwidth rather than mechanical movement. The improvement in Sweet Spot issue is good. It is not quite perfect but it's a lot better. I considered it a worthwhile upgrade, but others have said it's not worth the money.

As a first time user, either system will blow you away. It's only when you've had some experience of actually using the scope(s) that you begin to appreciate the technicalities and improvmeents that one may have over the other.

I know there's a lot of love out there for PSTs as first time solar scopes for reasonable money, but apart from the actual view, I found everything else on it a bit of a pain. When I took the Lunt path it felt much more comfortable and easy to use, though at a higher price of course.

Hope this helps,

Ant

[trazor]

Thanks........Ant, most helpful.

[jonathan]

I second the Lunt (as in my signature), it was my first and currently the only solar scope I have owned, to have anything better is probably going to cost considerably more and the gains diminish. I did read several times that the B1200 blocking filter is a considerable jump over the B600 so consider that too. Ha is better for visual observations, CaK is more useful for photography (so I read).

I can also highly recommend the Baader Hyperion 8-24 Zoom eyepiece, it works at least as well as my Celestron 25mm and 10mm eyepieces so saves me messing about with additional ones, also focus change between zoom levels is minimal.

Today I was observing the sun just before it went behind a tree, saw some lovely surface granulation, a large filament, and a nice big prominance (at the top as I looked at it), at one stage it looked just like a dog standing on the edge of the sun, wagging tail and everything! It is a bit like seeing shapes in clouds. Turning the pressure turner is like pulling on a motorbike throttle, it is slightly stiff due to the grease and the pressure so a good mount is recommended - I love it on my Omni CG-4.

I know a set up like mine will probably push your budget to just over £2,000, but if you're spending a sizable chunk of money on solar observing you may as well get the best you can afford. Don't forget you will need to purchase a Vixen dovetail bar too if you intend to mount it on a standard astronomy mount. I tried a camera mount (a big heavy one) but it was just no comparison to even an EQ1, and that was nowhere near as good as the CG-4.

I bought mine from Ian King Imaging, he seems to know his stuff so drop him an email for some advice.

[trazor]

Thank you Jonathan, most helpful.

[michael.h.f.wilkinson]

I got a Lunt LS35THa about a year back and it has been great fun. I am looking at bigger things now, and might actually build an 80mm. Both viewing and imaging is neat with these H-alpha scopes. My best results so far are these:

and that is with just 35mm aperture. 60 is a huge improvement

[jonathan]

Those images look great, I really should try my hand at some solar imaging too. What did you use to attach the camera?

[michael.h.f.wilkinson]

The nosepiece of the ASI130 fits directly into the focuser