Solar Radio Astronomy

[saturn]

Hi

Can anyone tell me what low frequencies the sun can be observed in and what can be observed.

Thanks Matt

[Carl Reade]

Hi

Can anyone tell me what low frequencies the sun can be observed in and what can be observed.

Thanks Matt

Hi you could start with Radio Jove. If you have a radio that can go to 20 Mhz or so, a dipole antenna and plugged into your PC soundcard. The software is free. You will be able to detect solar activity ie flares. The same system can detect storms on Jupiter. This would be a good start point.

Cheers Carl

[saturn]

Hi Carl

This sounds like a good starting point.

Thanks Matt

[Carl Reade]

Hi Carl

This sounds like a good starting point.

Thanks Matt

Hi Carl

This sounds like a good starting point.

Thanks Matt

Matt, I forgot to mention that you should look for a scanner or receiver that the AGC (automatic gain control) can be turned off and the software is called Skypipe.

Cheers Carl

[saturn]

Great thanks

[Wyvern]

Matt,

Can I suggest you get hold of "The Radio Sky and How to Observe It" by Jeff Lashley from Springer. ISBN 9781441908827. This is an excellent tome and one of the many projects it takes you through is the construction of a VLF solar radio telescope. It's quite easy to construct...... must be 'cos I'm doing so,.... and the output can be simply plugged into your computer sound card input. Use skypipe software and "eh voila". All explained in the book.... enjoy!!

Regards, Les

[athornett]

The Sun can be observed at just about any frequency from few hs to GHz. Ways I have observed the Sun in radio are listed below. In addition to this, the books describe using TV antennae and all sorts of other frequencies. Clearly in any radio observation of the sky, interference from terrestrial sources is always an issue and will dictate frequency choice.

1. Radio Jove - does excellent job of picking up solar flares directly. Large obvious traces very impressive but requires large amount of space for antenna and cost around £240 for kit plus you need to either be experienced at electronics or know someone who is to help you put kit together. Working at about 20MHz.

2. Very Low Frequency VLF receiver and aerial such as the one sold by UKRAA or SuperSID from USA. Both work really well detecting solar flares indirectly through their effect on the atmosphere - in reality these are total power receivers for military submarine radio transmissions and detect solar flares as a variation of the power in the transmissions going to these submarines as the transmission properties of the atmosphere change when solar flare hits. The flare appears as a sharks fin like shape in the trace. Working at less than 50KHz.

3. You can make a simple solar radio telescope from an old satellite dish and cheap satellite detector from eBay for < £20. This works at about 4GHz. Described in Jeff Lashley's excellent book mentioned above or on my website www.radioastronomy.me.uk (www.roslistonastronomy.org.uk)

Andy

[Schorhr]

A simple wire antenna plugged into a pc soundcard can detect when the Sun influences our magnetic field, something like

http://www.techlib.com/electronics/vlfwhistle.htm

http://www.geocities.jp/bitalemon3000/english.html

http://www.techlib.com/electronics/vlfwhistle.htm#Magnetic

but Don't plug into the Sound card durring thunder storms.