Post by patrickm on Mar 6, 2012 22:00:03 GMT -6
Though I had a boat load of work to do, I could not resist heading down to Sunken Gardens for a real observing session. Wind be damned!
Set up in the west side of our postage stamp-sized green space and commenced to aligning. After reading online, I decided to pass on the solar finder and just use the alignment of shadow of objective in the middle of the shadow of the clamshell. With a little patience, this works well, is a lot cheaper, and avoids more weight and an extra piece of gear.
Playing with this alignment while hunting it in my Celestron X-Cel LX 25mm eyepiece (60d AFOV) was a bit of a challenge. You have to be at just the right exit & pupil lateral distances for the sun to pop into view, otherwise black as black. Given this, it's possible to be on the sun but miss it by being just a tiny bit off-axis in any of the six directions from the eyepiece. This can make for frustrating alignment. Though 25mm will easily fit the sun into the FOV, I will try with both a lower power Plossl and an Ethos with a 1.25" barrel next time and see what that brings. As it stood, I only had my 25mm & 12mm X-Cels.
Once I had it centered, it was quite obvious that the wind was going move the scope around. Seeing was also subpar. Who knew it could make such a difference on something so huge? It does. Surface and edge detail was popping in and out constantly.
I did spend about an hour out there though. Most productive viewing was with the 25mm ep. I counted two huge sunspots and four or five different prominences that were easily visible between wind gusts.
Can't wait for a calm day! I need to make a solar shield of some sort out of foam board to cut the glare. It makes viewing a real challenge & rather unpleasant. I also need to set up with a chair. This viewing seems to lend itself to some long bouts of concentration and attention to detail. I look forward to getting it on a dovetail so I can put it on my 114SLT mount and track. Not having to worry about pushing the camera tripod too far one way or another will help a lot.
Oh yeah, I got a surprise view of an ORD jet crossing the face of the sun while my head was down observing. That was a really cool sight.
Yes, I can see how this would get exceedingly addictive.
Set up in the west side of our postage stamp-sized green space and commenced to aligning. After reading online, I decided to pass on the solar finder and just use the alignment of shadow of objective in the middle of the shadow of the clamshell. With a little patience, this works well, is a lot cheaper, and avoids more weight and an extra piece of gear.
Playing with this alignment while hunting it in my Celestron X-Cel LX 25mm eyepiece (60d AFOV) was a bit of a challenge. You have to be at just the right exit & pupil lateral distances for the sun to pop into view, otherwise black as black. Given this, it's possible to be on the sun but miss it by being just a tiny bit off-axis in any of the six directions from the eyepiece. This can make for frustrating alignment. Though 25mm will easily fit the sun into the FOV, I will try with both a lower power Plossl and an Ethos with a 1.25" barrel next time and see what that brings. As it stood, I only had my 25mm & 12mm X-Cels.
Once I had it centered, it was quite obvious that the wind was going move the scope around. Seeing was also subpar. Who knew it could make such a difference on something so huge? It does. Surface and edge detail was popping in and out constantly.
I did spend about an hour out there though. Most productive viewing was with the 25mm ep. I counted two huge sunspots and four or five different prominences that were easily visible between wind gusts.
Can't wait for a calm day! I need to make a solar shield of some sort out of foam board to cut the glare. It makes viewing a real challenge & rather unpleasant. I also need to set up with a chair. This viewing seems to lend itself to some long bouts of concentration and attention to detail. I look forward to getting it on a dovetail so I can put it on my 114SLT mount and track. Not having to worry about pushing the camera tripod too far one way or another will help a lot.
Oh yeah, I got a surprise view of an ORD jet crossing the face of the sun while my head was down observing. That was a really cool sight.
Yes, I can see how this would get exceedingly addictive.
