Lunt 80mm Ha scope immediate observations

[Paul Haese]

Hi all,

today I received my 80mm lunt scope from Bintel. The guys at Bintel gave good service once again and helped out immensely with the purchase.

In the first image below you can see the delivered scope. It comes triple boxed with the final box being the hard carry case. Inside the hard case I found the sol searcher, vixen bar, zoom eyepiece and of course the telescope.

Looking at the scope it presents as very robust. It weighs quite a lot and from the etalon to the dew shield (odd thing to have on a solar scope) which also has a screw in objective cap presents as very professionally made.

However where it falls down is the standard focusor. An upgrade is available but the GSO focusor which I found was slightly damaged (see the second imae) and would not turn properly. Bintel to their credit stated they would replace the focusor free of charge. Not to be outdone and being the tinkerer I am I set about fixing the focusor. I stripped down the focusor (see image below) and regreased the bearing race which had next to no grease in it which was why it was binding. When I reassembled the scope it worked perfectly and was very smooth. Something GSO ought to have got right at the factory (which seems to be a common problem with all their focusors).

So now to wait for the clouds to disappear and commence imaging with this new scope.

[AndrewJ]

Gday Paul

You will love the scope.
It's an awesomely good unit for the size and price.
Before i bought mine, I had read re problems with the std focusser
so stumped up for the FT unit.
I have to say it was well worth it, esp when trying to tweak that final bit of the resolution you get with the extra aperture.

Andrew

[Paul Haese]

No doubt your decision is most likely the best course of action, but I will be trying to use the standard focusor at least until I decide whether to upgrade or not. I think it will be ok for now. Lucky I am handy.

[alocky]

Hi Paul- congrats on the scope and look forward to the images you'll produce. For what it's worth, I stuck with the standard focuser and haven't really felt it worth upgrading even for imaging. What did take while was figuring out that the extra knurled screw in the case is the locking clamp for the focuser!
I believe Lunt will shortly be offering a focus motor solution for the standard Gso unit.
Cheers
Andrew.

[KenGee]

mmm I got a lunt 60 this week, I nearly went the 80 so I'll be keen to see how yours goes.

[frolinmod]

Congratulations on the Lunt 80. :sunny:

We need more upside-down solar images posted over on Solar Chat: http://solarchat.natca.net/index.php/en/
(http://solarchat.natca.net/index.php/en/)
I'm of the firm opinion that the Feather Touch focuser is a must have upgrade. No way would I ever want to deal with a lesser focuser. All my Lunt solar telescopes (and all my other refractors as well) have Feather Touch focusers on them. I guess that makes me a bit of a Feather Touch fanboy. :confuse3:
(http://solarchat.natca.net/index.php/en/)

[Paul Haese]

Thanks guys.

Andrew the screw did have me wondering. I figured it would become evident soon.



Ernie, I am a fan too. I have a spare feather touch that I need to get an adapter to suit.

I am a member of solar chat, but have not posted there for a month or so.

[Paul Haese]

First Light

As expected, brighter proms, sunspots visible, except that it is the first time I have seen spicules in the eyepiece. What a treat. Views were sharp and certainly provided more resolution than the 60mm. Perhaps a 100 would have been better. :question:

Not getting the double stack means the surface detail has less contrast, but for imaging this will be ok. I will consider a double stack unit for viewing in the future.

Using the 1800BF was a good idea and I have Bintel to thank for that. No ghosting present.

The focusor performed perfectly. The service work corrected the problem. So if you want to save yourself some money and are handy you can fix a dicky focusor that comes standard with these scopes.

Tuning was easy and totally even unlike the Coronado system. No sweet spots present that I could detect and for imaging this will be a boon. The Coronado system is fine for imaging but sweet spot management for mosaics can be a pain.

I found the reason for the extra screw. ;) Still think a dew shield is not necessary but it might keep bird poop off the objective.

Overall, a very nice instrument to use. Next couple of days or sometime this next week I will do a mosaic. Stay tuned. :D

[Poita]

Which scope were you using before for your images?

[Paul Haese]

Peter, I was using a solarmax 60 DS scope.

[frolinmod]

Paul, congratulations on receiving the "Solar Image of the Day" award over at http://www.solarastronomy.org and Solar Chat today.

[Peter Ward]

The Lunt 80 is a great scope, though I would have recommended the Feather touch option, as Lunt's crayford, as you have discovered , will mar with its first use. ( Sorry to say, good luck with a replacement.)

That said the PT is very cool, enabling blue to red doppler wing shifting which you can't do with a Meade/Coronado.

Enjoy the new scope :thumbsup:

[Merlin66]

Peter,
The Coronado PST and the SM front etalons will also allow you to chase the doppler shift.
The "design" position of the etalon is in the red wing and tuning moves it through Ha and into the blue wing.

[Peter Ward]

Guess my SM is a different spec, as I only ever see shifts from on band, then into the blue. (as evident from approaching proms being very easy to tune, but receeding ones are invariably dim)

[Merlin66]

Hmmmm
I'm using single and double stacked SM60 etalons on an ED80.
It's easy with them to see the red and blue wings.....

[Paul Haese]

Update

The focusor I fixed myself and worked perfectly. It just needed the right grease and the correct amount.

Unfortunately the whole scope has had to go back to Bintel, which they are replacing immediately. It will be delivered to me Wednesday from Melbourne.

The cause of this is the pressure tuner was not operating properly (ie not going up in pressure and going on band) and it would not hold pressure. The one I have here only shows the spots and faint prominences. It did not produce that hissing sound when you remove the piston from the brass threaded housing.

Bintel have sent one they have tested on the sun this morning and it holds tune and produces amazing detail.

So well done to the boys at Bintel for helping me out. Great service again.

[Paul Haese]

By the way Pete, you are right the FT is superb. I have a spare one here that can be used if I can get the adapter. That said the GSO is ok and works well for imaging if it is given the right treatment. ;) Although I wonder why Lunt sells a scope of such value and not install the FT as standard. It would be such a small expense, why have the FT as an upgrade?

[icytailmark]

Grats on the new scope paul. Maybe the next gen of Lunt scopes will come with FT as standard?

[frolinmod]

The LS100THa comes standard with a Feather Touch focuser.

[Waxing_Gibbous]

Beautiful, spectacular, scope.
Congratulations.
I've had a sqizz through an LS60 and was very impressed, so no doubt the 80 will give you that extra impressedness.
I want one, but the number of days of sunshine around here barelyjustify an LS35. :(
Post pics soon please! :D

[Paul Haese]

When I get the new one I will post pics. It is supposed to be here on Thursday. :)

[Paul Haese]

Up Date

Strike two. This scope is defective too. I am now waiting on what Lunt has to say. Bintel are dealing with the issue.

[Merlin66]

Paul,
What was the issue this time???

[Paul Haese]

Ken same problem. The scope does not come on band properly. Even Bintel staff who have looked through these scopes a lot have said there is little detail in the scope I returned. Even the proms are very faint.

[frolinmod]

Paul, what are the serial numbers of the bad scopes? That will give some indication of when they were manufactured and that might be interesting.

[Paul Haese]

Ernie, the number of the one I have now is 2012293. Obviously made this year. The other one I did not record the serial number. It gave similar results.

[Paul Haese]

The scope is going back and Bintel think this is an etalon decontacting issue. Perhaps from transport. I will update more when I know more. :shrug:

[alocky]

Sorry to hear what a rough time you're having.
Interesting you say it never goes 'on band'. Mine starts off pretty much on band, and as I wind the pressure tuner in it goes off towards the end of travel. It's usually hard to tell where the sweet spot is, as there's not a huge amount of change, and it's more a case of how much of the fov is well defined.
There's been no mention of this problem on the Lunt forum on Yahoo, but there seem to be a few guys who wish they hadn't gone for the double stack option.
cheers,
Andrew.

[Paul Haese]

What your describing is pretty normal Andrew. There is tuning from red wing to blue wing. The units I have had also do not come on band in the center of view and proms when centered there seem to dim a lot. Bintel are on to it and sorting it though and I will hear about it next week.

[Peter Ward]

I was pondering the very same "on band" question with my setup....and discovered the Meade (Coronado ) Etalon was marginal at best, yet my original Coronado SM90 produced excellent images.

Not for the faint of heart, but I decided the Meade unit need re-tuning and did just that today. Hallelujah !! What a difference !

With a new camera arriving this week I'm quite looking forward to the results from the newly tuned system.

[AstroFlyer]

Can you please elaborate?
What do you mean by "re-tuning"?

[Paul Haese]

Update

Bintel are trying to get in contact with Lunt but it seems no one wants to give an answer to the suggestion of providing me with a hand picked scope out of the next shipment. A simple answer yes or no would suffice and then we can make alternative plans if necessary. As it is; it might be unlikely now that I can get a Coronado front DS set due to the lag time.

For a company with a reputation of customer service in mind I find Lunts lack of response somewhat perplexing. Couple more days and I will be getting upset.

Bintel have made every effort to help in this problem and are no way the problem. I need answers.

[alocky]

I had a few issues with the Herschel wedge I bought from them, but I was extremely satisfied with the service and resolution I received at the time. I understand they were completely swamped before the Transit in June, but would have thought that was behind them.
I would recommend placing a call direct to Rikki at Lunt, and dealing direct. At least you won't be waiting for second hand information, even though I'm sure the guys at bintel are on the job, its never the same playing Chinese whispers.

[Paul Haese]

Thanks Andrew. I will see what transpires tomorrow, but Bintel tell me that they got an answering machine this morning, so me ringing them is most likely not going to produce any better results at this stage. If I find I need to I will call.

I hope my wedge that I just got does not have any problems. I am yet to test that. :shrug:.

My preference is for a suitable scope being sent to me. Not necessarily hand picked but one that works as it should and then I will be most happy.

[Merlin66]

Hmmm
Sorry to hear about all your trials and tribulations....
For the prices we currently pay for this specialised solar equipment I would not have expected these problems!

[alocky]

I got the distinct impression the time difference between Vic (or NSW) and Arizona left a very narrow time window during opening hours...
Anyway- best of luck. And make sure there is a ND3 filter in your solar wedge before you put your eye to it!
Cheers,
Andrew.

[Poita]

Paul, whenever I have had issues with Lunt, I have phoned them directly and have usually got reasonable results that way.
I explain to them that my Australian distributer has had trouble calling due to the small time-difference window, and that way it isn't dissing the supplier.

Lunt seems to flip flop from great customer service response times to quite poor ones, but they have always come through in the end.

But I'd give them a ring, you deserve a hand picked model, or at least a double checked one.

-P

[Paul Haese]

Yeah I think you guys are right. I don't want to rock the boat but I know it is hard for our suppliers to get answers. If I hear nothing tomorrow I will ring early on Saturday morning. With any luck this can be resolved quickly.

[Paul Haese]

Both Bintel and myself rang yesterday morning and we got answers. A new batch of scopes will be completed next week and one which is good will be drop shipped to me. I would expect it will be here the following week. With any luck this one will prove to be the charm.

[Merlin66]

Hmmmm
If you get the good one....who gets the others?????

[frolinmod]

I want Paul doing QA on all my future equipment purchases. :evil:

[MikeyB]

The question is, whether the problems that Paul has found arose as a result of transit stresses or from deficiencies in factory quality control inspection and supplier checking. If the former, Lunt need to improve their product packaging; if the latter, Lunt and local suppliers need to improve their QA procedures.

[Merlin66]

Either way there's a probability of failure......

[Paul Haese]

New scope is almost here. I should see it in the next couple of days. Cloud and rain already predicted. LOL. Maybe next week.

[Paul Haese]

On its way here via TNT. Tested at Bintel and it got their thumbs up. Expected arrival on 25th. Looking forward to it. :)

[Merlin66]

Sounds like great news. I sincerely hope it lives up to expectations.

[Paul Haese]

Ken I am very hopeful that this one will be great and all that I have heard about. Looks like some nice new active regions are coming around just in time.

[Paul Haese]

Update

Finally got a good scope. See images here (http://www.iceinspace.com.au/forum/showthread.php?p=896969#post896969) .

The scope gives a great view visually and view looks very nice when capturing data.

I want to once again make a special thank you for Michael and the team at Bintel. They have been great in sorting this issue for me and no doubt it has cost them in more ways than one. If you want good service in Australia you can't go wrong with dealing with them. :thumbsup:

[Poita]

Fantastic news, it will be good to give the new camera a run on it.

[Paul Haese]

Currently processing some data with the new camera at a 2x barlow in average seeing and a slightly better tuning of the etalon. Looks very nice, I will post up the results once processing has finished. The files on the new camera are huge and take forever to process out. Six panel mosaic and each panel is a 15.8 mb image once stacking has taken place. Each one takes an hour to align and stack. Next step a faster laptop.

[Lothar]

Hello Paul,
I am considering a Lunt 80mm.
Reading your past Lunt trials is interesting.
Could you please give an update on how the latest scope went.
Does anyone know if Lunt etalong quality is still so dodgy?
How has the Crayford focuser been holding up? It really pains me to think they make a >$AU5K scope with a poor quality focuser.
Regards,
Lothar.

[Paul Haese]

Hi Lothar,

The scope was replaced twice and I eventually got a good one. I have never had any trouble since. Bintel gave good service and Lunt whilst a bit hard to get going on the service front, it did come through in the end.

[rjl]

Hi Paul
Am also looking at buying an 80 mm. Wondering who I should ask to speak to at Bintel regarding the current status of LUNT QC. I'm over in NZ and returning scopes etc would be quite a hurdle.
Thanks
Richard

[Paul Haese]

Richard both Michael and Don in Sydney should be able to help you.

[rjl]

Thanks Paul