Friday 4th Sol

[Saturnine]

Took the opportunity to try and image Sol today but the seeing was terrible by the time Sol was in my imaging line of sight. Just for the sake of keeping a daily record of the active regions.

White light - ED80, Baader Solar Film Filter, EQ5, ZWO290mc, 100 / 1000 frames in Registax.

Ha - 85mm f10.5 achro, PST Stage 1 conversion, same mount and camera

[Foxinsox]

Beautiful images, Jeff,

May I ask, what Ha filter setup did you use on your F10 ?:)

[Saturnine]

Hi Graeme

Look up the PST Stage 1 conversion in your preferred search engine. That will explain what is involved in converting a refractor to a Ha scope.
Basically, in my case, it is the black box of an PST scope fitted to the 2" drawtube via an adapter that screws into the front of the Etalon Filter then into the drawtube of an 4" / 102mm f9 refractor with a Baader ERF in a cell that fits into the dewshield at the front of the refractor. The black box consists of the Etalon, a tunable filter at the front with an internal pentaprism that is used to achieve focus then the 5mm blocking filter at the bottom of the eyepiece holder.
The ERF ( Energy Rejection Filter ) as the name suggests, limits the amount of radiation energy entering the telescope before the Etalon and Blocking Filter further reduce the energy of the Ha end of the spectrum down to 1uM.
At least I hope the description is accurate, other more knowledgeable forum members feel free to add anything that I may have gotten wrong in the description .

[Foxinsox]

I did as you said, Jeff: learning all about re-birthing PST's into something beautiful and powerful !
I now have a new project .
thank you
Graeme

[Saturnine]

Hi Again Graeme

Just be aware that the full aperture Baader ERFs' are not cheap, because they are a specialised filter after all. My 90mm piece of "red glass" cost over $500 AUD and that was when the Aus $ was 10% more favourable than now. The PST has a 40mm objecive lens so even converting a 70 or 80mm refractor to accept the PST black box using a 75mm ERF will increase resolution substantially.

https://www.teleskop-express.de/shop/index.php/cat/c255_Solarfilter-for-H-Alpha-and-Calcium-Light.html

I think that any further discussion about the subject may be better served in the ATM section, as this is the images area.

[PeterM]

Well done Jeff. I am hoping to try some white light on this AR this week if weather allows.

[Eris]

A good set of images Jeff. Your PST coversion approach is very interesting.