Solar beginner.

[banjaxed]

I am taking my first steps into solar viewing with a Skywatcher Startravel 120 and a Kendrick filter. After viewing for a few minutes is it normal to get the same feeling as you get when looking at the moon without a filter where it takes a while for your eye to readjust. Viewing the moon without a filter gives me problems so it could be my eyes are just sensitive even though I don't have any other eyesight problems. Any advice would be appreciated.

 

[Davey-T]

Not sure what you're seeing but staring at any bright light source will leave an imprint on the retina for a bit.

Dave

[banjaxed]

Thanks for your reply Dave and for confirming what I suspected. Looks like there is no such thing as pleasure without pain 😀

[RT65CB-SWL]

Is the Kendrick filer the film type? - I used to get the same too! ...then I 'upgraded' to a Thousand Oaks glass one; (though that is no longer used now, as it has a few 'pin-pricks' which are not visible, unless I hold it up to a bright light source, including the Sun, before being put on my refractor). Maybe a variable polarising filter would help.

I now use a solar wedge; (with a built-in ND3.0 filter); which is IMHO, a lot safer. Without the Solar Continuum or additional Polarising filter; (fitted to the eyepiece); the Sun's disc is still extremely bright.  

[banjaxed]

50 minutes ago, Philip R said:

Is the Kendrick filer the film type? - I used to get the same too! ...then I 'upgraded' to a Thousand Oaks glass one; (though that is no longer used now, as it has a few 'pin-pricks' which are not visible, unless I hold it up to a bright light source, including the Sun, before being put on my refractor). Maybe a variable polarising filter would help.

I now use a solar wedge; (with a built-in ND3.0 filter); which is IMHO, a lot safer. Without the Solar Continuum or additional Polarising filter; (fitted to the eyepiece); the Sun's disc is still extremely bright.  

Hi Philip, yes it is the Baader solar film type filter which I thought was decent quality being made by Baader. Your suggestion about using a polarising filter seems like a possible solution so as I already have one I will try it when the opportunity arises. Thanks for your input.

Maurice.

[Paz]

The polarising filter is a good idea to dim things a bit. Another thing to try is any colour filter - they will also dim the image plus achieve a couple of other things at the same time... one thing is they narrow down the colour range and so reduce chromatic aberration if you are using a scope that presents it, and the other is, if the colour filter chops out blue light then it will reduce blue light scatter.

Another option you can try is to use the aperture stop that the ST120 has in the lense cap to reduce the aperture physically, but this will reduce resolving power as well as brightness.

I started solar observing with a ST120 and a solar film - it dims the light to about 1/100,000 on its own. I now use a solar wedge and that, with a polarising filter, can dim over a wide rang from much less to much more than 1/100,000.