Quark qualms quelled

[Merlin66]

I did a comparison of all the current available solar filters in my book "Imaging Sunlight".

The Daystar site has some detail on their sold etalon design(s), the heating and cooling (not on the Quark) changes the effective etalon tuning.

https://books.google.com.au/books?id=l2RBDAAAQBAJ&pg=PA14&lpg=PA14&dq=daystar+solar+filter+review&source=bl&ots=oKAJbMiMT4&sig=sFkcPllCVMi6MfnF9XSAAl7HhMw&hl=en&sa=X&ved=0ahUKEwi6vt2o0_7UAhUJYlAKHZHFCTw4PBDoAQgqMAU

[Pig]

I agree with Charl on page 1 of this thread, I have yet to see a solar view that bests the Quark, full disc or not ?

[John]

On 24/06/2017 at 09:27, ollypenrice said:

So are Quarks now going out with bearable QA? They have to be interestng but the variability in QA put me right off. The only one to appear here was a new replacement for an original dud and was also a dud itself when opened and tried.

Olly

I felt the same Olly.

It's a little odd how we moan about things like bearings wearing tracks in the drawtube of a focuser with no effect on operation, loose rubber eye cups, and dust caps that are a little loose etc, etc, and yet seem rather accepting of some awful QC issues with a product that cost the best part of £1,000

Must have been a nightmare for the dealers who handled them as Keiron McGrath expressed in his heartfelt piece on the device:

Quark NOT.pdf

[GUS]

9 hours ago, Macavity said:

Does anyone know how the Quarks work? <grin> I know a bit about pressure tuning
and (external) double-stacking filters etc.: Change of Air Density, "tilting things" etc. 

Casually wondering where external power... HEATING things(?!) comes into all this? 

Wouldn't know, but here are some words from da maan himself, the king. See if you can get an inkling into the unveiling of the mystery:

https://www.cloudynights.com/topic/534901-double-stacking-a-daystar-quark/

[ollypenrice]

12 minutes ago, John said:

I felt the same Olly.

It's a little odd how we moan about things like bearings wearing tracks in the drawtube of a focuser with no effect on operation, loose rubber eye cups, and dust caps that are a little loose etc, etc, and yet seem rather accepting of some awful QC issues with a product that cost the best part of £1,000

Must have been a nightmare for the dealers who handled them as Keiron McGrath expressed in his heartfelt piece on the device:

Quark NOT.pdf

Yikes, that is a terrible story. I'll keep clear.

Olly

[johnfosteruk]

Threads like these are invaluable. I see Charl and the like getting good results with their Quark and think 'that's my route into H-alpha.' Then I read about experiences like Kieron's, Davey-T etc and it's clear that it's a lottery. 

I guess I need to save 3 times longer for a Lunt then.

[GUS]

I had to send mine back for inspection/repair and it was brand new. All the way from Chile; it's just arrived in the US. Damn Daystar, they couldn't bother to see if something works before selling it. Makes me mad. All the hard work coming up with the Quark going to waste for failing on a simple but crucial step of the process - end of the line quality inspection and field testing. Sloppiness. Well, they're paying the price for it, and so am I, literally. 

[xtreemchaos]

like any cutting edge piece of kit theres going to be teething problems, before quarks arrived on the market you had to spend many more k to get the same results.

I think like anything in life its a risk, for me the results far outway the risk and if the worse should happen you can allways send it back if still under 5 years old.

£1000 is a lot of money but its only the same as two black and green eye pieces.  charl.

[Stu]

9 minutes ago, xtreemchaos said:

like any cutting edge piece of kit theres going to be teething problems, before quarks arrived on the market you had to spend many more k to get the same results.

I think like anything in life its a risk, for me the results far outway the risk and if the worse should happen you can allways send it back if still under 5 years old.

£1000 is a lot of money but its only the same as two black and green eye pieces.  charl.

There are, I suppose, two parts to the Quarks variable QC. First is the unreliability, which from a supposedly good brand is unacceptable in my book.

The second part is the variability in contrast which is seen. I kind of understand why this is the case, given their need to accept a broad range of tolerances in order to stick within a budget. My big issue is that people choosing a Quark as their 1st Ha 'scope' have no idea what to expect, and those that receive a poor contrast unit are likely to think that Ha observing is pretty poor, when the reality is just the opposite.

I had a decent enough experience with my Quark, it was reliable, and had good contrast although it did exhibit banding across the field when operating at optimum focal length i.e. Minimum bandwidth. I was prepared to live with it as it was as the views were pretty spectacular.

I used it in scopes from 60mm to 150mm, it was fabulous in my TV85 and 106mm Triplet, the 120ED also worked well but the focal length meant that better conditions were needed to get the best out of it. In the 60mm Tak it was significantly better than my PST which itself was a good unit.

[Peter Drew]

11 hours ago, Macavity said:

Does anyone know how the Quarks work? <grin> I know a bit about pressure tuning
and (external) double-stacking filters etc.: Change of Air Density, "tilting things" etc. 

Casually wondering where external power... HEATING things(?!) comes into all this? 

The Quark and other Daystar Ha products employ an approach different to those of their competitors. Instead of precisely parallel polished and spaced glass discs that have to be tilted or pressurised to adjust the tuning, Daystar use a mica chip. The property of a mica chip is that when heated, the crystals forming the chip change its transmitted bandwidth, by adjusting the temperature the bandwidth can be tuned to provide the Ha image. This is a very simplified explanation but highlights the difference and the need for a heating system.    

[vlaiv]

I've had my eyes on quark for quite some time now as a means for affordable entry into ha solar (still not there yet in terms of funding, hope to be next year).

I've also read mentioned Quark Not.pdf, and I noticed something interesting - purchases and returns that were faulty afterwards, as far as I can see (I might have not payed full attention) are done in December / January. It also says on product description, to quote:

"A Fabry-Pérot filter may never freeze. Being made for working at a very specific temperature, a complex filter should not be exposed to temperatures below 5 °C (40 °F).

The immersion oil which connects the optical elements can solidify. Then, it presses them apart and the coatings of the to 1/200 lambda plane-parallel polished etalon plate suffer damage."

(taken from Telescope Service website on product info page, but I'm sure that I've read something similar in actual quark manual).

Now, I wonder if those units suffered low temperatures "in transit" while being shipped / handled (maybe even low temps on high altitude in airplane cargo bay if airlifted regardless of season)? That might explain them leaving factory in good condition but being bad upon arrival?
 

3 hours ago, GUS said:

I had to send mine back for inspection/repair and it was brand new. All the way from Chile; it's just arrived in the US. Damn Daystar, they couldn't bother to see if something works before selling it. Makes me mad. All the hard work coming up with the Quark going to waste for failing on a simple but crucial step of the process - end of the line quality inspection and field testing. Sloppiness. Well, they're paying the price for it, and so am I, literally. 

When was this? Was it cold season at the time of your purchase / when you had your unit shipped to you the first time?

[Pig]

This is the problem with bad press, I have heard so many people on here commenting about Quarks that have not owned one or even looked through one, just parroting second hand stories. It is Daystars fault for giving such poor service when folk experienced problems and they really have ruined a very good product purely on this basis.  But believe me if your disappointed in a the views delivered by a Quark you are going to be even more disappointed in the views from a Lunt, especially so when you eventually get to look through a Quark..... I am inclined to agree with Stu in that expectations are set very high to start with.

[Davey-T]

My Quark has been a PITA  but I don't regret buying it, on that rare day of great seeing it produces breathtaking views of the Sun that you could only get from something costing 3 times the price, compared to close ups with my LS60 there's no contest and the Quark wins hands down without even breaking into a sweat.

What's really teed me off isn't Daystar who are a a bit disjointed in the communication department, so I had to phone them a few times, it is the attitude of HMRC or their agents who seemed to delight in being as obstructive as possible and prevaricate for weeks expediting a simple transaction. After going back to Daystar twice at their expense and arriving there a couple of days later it has then spent nearly 3 YES 3  months in limbo in the UK customs dept on return to the UK.

Dave

[ollypenrice]

Interesting point from Vlav about possible damage caused by low temperatures in transit. Aircraft holds and ground storage areas can indeed be very cold.

However, on QC issues I think it really is incredibly simple. The overwhelming majority of units sent out should work to specification.  Surely this can't be a contentious idea? I run what has been called the cheapest car ever made in terms of price/spec (the Dacia Duster) and, despite having a lot more parts than a Quark, it has had precisely no QC issues at all in over two years. Ditto its predecessor, the also-cheapo Panda.

What do we know about the present state of QC with this product? If the QC is sorted then I'd take the plunge.

Olly

[vlaiv]

I just did a bit of research on the issue, it looks like passenger aircraft keep cargo bay 7C+ by diverting heated cabin air to cargo area and there is part that is kept at 18C possibly for animals / pets. I could not find specs on cargo aircraft, apart that some carriers offer specific services for cargo that must be kept at certain temperature, like medicine / animals / plants / whatever.

This probably means that there is no general temperature regulation for unspecified cargo and temperatures can easily fall below 5C for longer duration in cross Atlantic airlift.

[Floater]

10 hours ago, Stu said:

 My big issue is that people choosing a Quark as their 1st Ha 'scope' have no idea what to expect, and those that receive a poor contrast unit are likely to think that Ha observing is pretty poor, when the reality is just the opposite.

This is precisely how I feel about it ... and I've been banging on about it for ages.

2 hours ago, Pig said:

 

But believe me if your disappointed in a the views delivered by a Quark you are going to be even more disappointed in the views from a Lunt, especially so when you eventually get to look through a Quark..... I am inclined to agree with Stu in that expectations are set very high to start with.

 

Ah, Shaun, you've put into words just what I fear. I'm trying to get the chance to compare my Lunt 60 with a similar instrument owned by a very accomplished solar imager because I'm not blown away by the views mine produces ... and I feel I should be!

[John]

Surely the manufacturer would be aware of issues that might harm a sensitive instrument in transit and take precautions to ensure that no harm occurs, even if that means using a different shipping method ?

 

[vlaiv]

1 minute ago, John said:

Surely the manufacturer would be aware of issues that might harm a sensitive instrument in transit and take precautions to ensure that no harm occurs, even if that means using a different shipping method ?

 

Yes, probably that might be the case,

1 hour ago, Davey-T said:

After going back to Daystar twice at their expense and arriving there a couple of days later it has then spent nearly 3 YES 3  months in limbo in the UK customs dept on return to the UK.

but what about temporary storage in transit? ^^.

I'm not implying that this is the case, I'm just wondering if it might be part of the reason of the problem, other being poor QC at some point - which might or might not still exist on part of manufacturer.

All of these can combine to give rather poor image of the quality of product, and that poor image might linger on for quite some time.

Part of me wishes this were true - I kind of feel better if there is real reason behind failures rather than playing lottery when purchasing a product

[GUS]

Hey VlaiV,

I bought it in September 2015 which is the north's fall, so maybe airplane temperatures played a role, good thinking, but I don't think so. I said it was brand new because I couldn't use it until only recently because the only scope I had was a 120mm and I didn't want to risk burning it on that before buying an ERF, which I never managed to afford. Then I bought a sv60eds and a baader uv-ir cut but didn't have a tripod to put it on, tragicomically, until I'd say two months ago when I bought the Celestron heavy duty alt- azimuth. So when I finally managed to try it out (once I tried just holding it but when I could manage to get the sun in view it would quickly fly off and then the painstaking process of chasing it around would start all over again - frustrating, besides I couldn't assess anything with an unstable view. Anyway, once I put it on the tripod I only had clear detail on prominences and faint detail on the last fifth I'd say of the outer rim, if that, the rest was basically just an orange to red blob; this and the prominences being sharp would hold regardless of the position of the dial, despite allowing for required heating up or tuning times. To be fair Daystar was cooperative and offered to pay for return shipping. I still have to pay for postage both ways though and hopefully not any customs duties on the return. They'd do better verifying each unit before shipping than being congenial later.

Ps: The only eyepiece I've tried it on and the only one I have, for now, is the Celestron zoom 8-24mm. I've since sold the 120mm which was the Orion 120mm f5 which I used on the iOptron minitower 2, also gone. I had also sold a few stock eyepieces along with the setup before testing the Quark. Go figure, yesterday I ordered two Orion short tube 80's!! They've just been discontinued and replaced with a cheaper version that isn't fully multi-coated and come a tripod so I'm more than thrilled to have managed to get hold of two, just in case, and that way I can use one with the quark and at the same time the other with Baader Astrosolar film which I fashioned into cardboard to put over a pair of 10x70 Comet binoculars I have, and with the sv60eds. Speaking of which, has anyone experienced ca with white light observing? I don't have any, not with the binoculars and much less with the sv60eds. Tip: It just recently occurred to me to use my moon filter when looking at white light, before I would just put on sunglasses.

[Davey-T]

43 minutes ago, vlaiv said:

Yes, probably that might be the case,

but what about temporary storage in transit? ^^.

I'm not implying that this is the case, I'm just wondering if it might be part of the reason of the problem, other being poor QC at some point - which might or might not still exist on part of manufacturer.

All of these can combine to give rather poor image of the quality of product, and that poor image might linger on for quite some time.

Part of me wishes this were true - I kind of feel better if there is real reason behind failures rather than playing lottery when purchasing a product

Mine worked perfectly for 2 years, always stored indoors in a flightcase when not in use.

Dave

[Macavity]

10 hours ago, Peter Drew said:

The Quark and other Daystar Ha products employ an approach different to those of their competitors. Instead of precisely parallel polished and spaced glass discs that have to be tilted or pressurised to adjust the tuning, Daystar use a mica chip. The property of a mica chip is that when heated, the crystals forming the chip change its transmitted bandwidth, by adjusting the temperature the bandwidth can be tuned to provide the Ha image. This is a very simplified explanation but highlights the difference and the need for a heating system.    

Thanks Pete and @GUS (for the CN link)! I *imagine* it might be based on
the phenomenom of: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Birefringence (maybe) 
(Such things seem to be mentioned by NASA re. solar imaging tho!)

Better than the...  "Pixie Dust" explanation I got from one *dealer* re. a 
completely unrelated item. But then I did get a big "ROFL" anyway!

 

[xtreemchaos]

my thinking is I exspect mine to fail at some point, there not designed to last forever, if I get 2 years like Dave before I have to send it back id be well happy, ive had mine since feb and boy has it worked hard, I use mine most days and thay perform well even though thin cloud.

outa interest whats the longest ones lasted, has anybody still got one which has lasted the full 5 years ?. charl.

[Mark at Beaufort]

19 minutes ago, xtreemchaos said:

my thinking is I exspect mine to fail at some point, there not designed to last forever, if I get 2 years like Dave before I have to send it back id be well happy, ive had mine since feb and boy has it worked hard, I use mine most days and thay perform well even though thin cloud.

outa interest whats the longest ones lasted, has anybody still got one which has lasted the full 5 years ?. charl.

Charl for over £1000 I would hope, if you have a good one, that it would last at least 5 years, if not more. I accept that the view is fantastic having looked through @Stu's at the SGL star party and partial eclipse.

I bought my PST in 2005 and its still providing wonderful views especially as I added the Double Stack about a 4/6 weeks ago.

[xtreemchaos]

thanks Mark, that's good news mate, before I brought my Quark, I read a lot of posts good and bad and prepared my mind with the what ifs, there is a lot of bad reports but theres a lot more good ones . hopefully by the time mine has a turn for the worse ill have the cash saved up to buy another one while it gets repaired as the turn around time is the biggest worry for me "I mean I'm not getting any younger".

Id love to have a look though your setup, ive never had a go with a PST DS, I bet the views amazing, I have had a go with a 60mm lunt DS and the view was breathtaking, but id never be able to save enough for the lunt 3k+ setup, that's why I when for the Quark it was the cheapest way for me to get results. 

charl.

[Davey-T]

1 hour ago, xtreemchaos said:

my thinking is I exspect mine to fail at some point, there not designed to last forever, if I get 2 years like Dave before I have to send it back id be well happy, ive had mine since feb and boy has it worked hard, I use mine most days and thay perform well even though thin cloud.

outa interest whats the longest ones lasted, has anybody still got one which has lasted the full 5 years ?. charl.

They have a 5 year warranty I think, not sure if they've actually been out 5 years yet, after 5 years Daystar recommend sending them back for refurb.

Dave