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Lunt 8x32 Solar Bins.

LukeSkywatcher

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LukeSkywatcher

LukeSkywatcher

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Hi all

I may very soon be the owner of a pair of Lunt 8x32 solar Bins. I'm just wondering if anyone has used them, and your opinion on them. Really good price (being sold by a fellow SGL member), couldn't resist. Hopefully they will be mine. They'd make a nice addition to my bin family. 

Thanks

Paul 

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johninderby

johninderby

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I had a pair of the Coranado Binomites once and used then mainly for a quick look at the sun to see if there was any activity before deciding to get the scope out or not. So yes they will be very usefull for that purpose.

Surprisingly found getting the sun in view with them was more difficult than you’d think but fitting a solar finder made them much easier to use.

I was looking at these myself but just bought some other stuff so no budget left for them this week. :icon_biggrin:

 

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LukeSkywatcher

LukeSkywatcher

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I was thinking the same way. Quick check on any activity before deciding to bring out scope and wedge. Shame I can't do that for Ha. 

I agree, that big ball of yellow in the sky isn't so easy to find. You'd think it would be given that it appears the same size as a full moon and most can find that within a second or two. 

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LukeSkywatcher

LukeSkywatcher

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17 minutes ago, tooth_dr said:

I bought a pair of the 6x30s. I keep them at work for a quick look at lunchtime. The 8x would be better. 

01742265-F736-447A-BB22-C2847DFB13AE.jpeg

Do they work well?. Saw them on a Google search and my first thought was "kids toy". 

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tooth_dr

tooth_dr

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10 minutes ago, LukeSkywatcher said:

Do they work well?. Saw them on Lunt website and my first thought was "kids toy". 

They work well. Each eye cup does the focusing and if you look carefully you can see most sunspots no matter how small. I bought them on holiday in the states for £27 from Lunt off amazon so it was hard to say no at that price. 

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LukeSkywatcher

LukeSkywatcher

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3 minutes ago, tooth_dr said:

They work well. Each eye cup does the focusing and if you look carefully you can see most sunspots no matter how small. I bought them on holiday in the states for £27 from Lunt off amazon so it was hard to say no at that price. 

The 8x30 model of same bins you have cost about 5 times more. 

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LukeSkywatcher

LukeSkywatcher

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11 hours ago, mark81 said:

nice job! I and I'm sure many others will look forward to hear how you get in with these.

I'll mainly be using them to do quick checks for sunspots. If there are any, then I will bring my WL solar setup outside. If there are none, I'll bring my Ha setup outside. Only difference between them both is I use a Hershel wedge for WL and a Quark for Ha. I use the same 70mm refractor for both

 

 

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Alan White

Alan White

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Paul

I will be interested how they work, as I have often looked at these.

Well I did look at this very pair but had to await some funds and you struck quick. Congratulations.

Please let us all know how they work.

Alan

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LukeSkywatcher

LukeSkywatcher

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1 hour ago, Alan White said:

Paul

I will be interested how they work, as I have often looked at these.

Well I did look at this very pair but had to await some funds and you struck quick. Congratulations.

Please let us all know how they work.

Alan

Will do Alan. Ive wanted a pair of solar bins for quite a while and when i saw these and the price, could not resist.

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LukeSkywatcher

LukeSkywatcher

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Solar Bins arrived today. They are beautiful. Not too heavy, not too light. Thankfully the Sun is out so I got to try them straight away. The image is very sharp and clear, bright. They present the Sun in a very pleasing size. I wasn't able to see the latest AR because my arms are aching from just getting used to being back in the wheelchair, so was hard to keep steady. 

 

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BinocularSky

BinocularSky

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This arrived yesterday arvo:

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Managed a glimpse of the Sun through thin cloud this morning; seem OK.

Chose the 10x25 because:
* Light gathering of 25mm is not going to be an issue with the Sun.
* Dawes limit of 25mm is not going to be an issue at 10x.
* 10x will almost certainly show me more detail than the 6x or 8x of other offerings.
* I'm a cheapskate, and these are now heavily discounted in the US (eclipse has passed) - only $40 including shipping and import tax.

The filters (actually 2 in each side) unscrew, leaving a bare tube end, but enables you to check collimation & set the right eyepiece dioptre during daylight. Careful: it would be very easy to cross-thread these!

They snap to focus quite nicely, but only the central quarter of the FoV is properly sharp (but FoV is 5.7*, and the Sun is only 0.5*, so that needn't be an issue) - mixture of field curvature, astigmatism and coma; I expect stars would look like small fuzzy seagulls near the edge ?. Severe negative (pincushion) distortion near the periphery, but the image is so blurred there that it's not usable anyway.

Claim to be multi-coated.

One of the hinges is much looser than the other. It's going to annoy me, so I need to learn how to dismantle and tweak compacts.

The included instruction manual only covers the 10x42, not the 10x25 (same for electronic version on Celestron's website).

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BinocularSky

BinocularSky

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On 19/05/2018 at 07:29, johninderby said:

Surprisingly found getting the sun in view with them was more difficult than you’d think

Given the comments on Amazon (US) about solar binoculars not showing anything at all, you are clearly not alone. My technique (if you can dignify it with that name), is to hold the binoc slightly away from my eyes, line the hinge up with a point vertically below the Sun, raise the binoc to my eyes without moving my head, then slowly pan upwards. I haven't rigorously quantified it, but I reckon that this gives me a success rate in excess of 80% ? (at least high enough that I feel no need to seek other solutions).

For mounted solar-filtered binocs, I look at the shadow they cast.

 

 

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Stu

Stu

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On 31/05/2018 at 14:55, LukeSkywatcher said:

"only $40 including shipping and import tax".

Oh there's no emoji that covers my feelings right now. Excuse me while i go outside and vent loudly (in French).

I would much rather have the Lunts Paul, totally different quality I should think.

I suspect it will only be the larger ARs you can see but still fun for quick sessions. I used my 10x25 Coronado Binomites to observe one of the previous transits of Mercury, very clear it was too. Next one is November 11th 2019, will be here before you know it!!

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