Winchester Park Sun Party 4-27-2013
What a morning. I arrived at 8:00 AM, to find the entire park full to the gills. A 5K race was about to start, and there wasn't even parking available on the street. Alpine Stringham had been there about 5 minutes already and was on the phone to others enroute. Rodger arrived shortly thereafter and made the decision to go ahead with the event and just haul his equipment from as far as he had to. Fortunately the race was about over by 9, and most of us got to park in the usual spot next to the grass. I needed power for my mount so I grabbed the first spot to open up. Seeing was terrific up until about 11:30, when I noticed it beginning to soften a bit. Still good, just not as crisp as it was earlier. Lots of activity today, prominences almost all the way around the limb and some very interesting shapes. I counted at least 5 decent flocculi and lots of large areas of plage. One large sunpot group and several smaller active regions were seen. This was the first test-run for my side-by-side setup of the PST and a white-light scope on the same equatorial mount. I started with an older Orion 80mm doublet refractor with a Thousand Oaks glass solar filter for the white side, but quickly changed to a 50mm scope with a Baader filter, which showed a much better, more contrasty image. I was pleased that both scopes had the sun centered without having to resort to shims under one of them. Alignment was spot-on. I hooked up my B&W Meade "electronic eyepiece" to both scopes and was very pleased with the detail seen on my 7" LCD monitor. The H-a view was amazing. Sunspots were plainly visible in the white-light view. The black plastic eyepiece housing soon overheated in the sun and after that I couldn't get anything but a white disk, so I retired the video and went back to visual observing only. It turns out that we didn't triple-stack the PST after all- I completely forgot to ask Bill Cowles about it, and he didn't bring it up either! The views through his scopes were just outstanding. Anybody with a three or four thousand dollar solar budget would do well to copy his setup. But for just under a grand, I'm pretty happy with the double-stacked PST. I'm going to try imaging with the PST again soon but will use a higher resolution camera next time, the electronic eyepiece uses a pretty small chip with only "webcam" resolution. OK if you plan to stack stills but for video sequences it's not fine enough. Too, starting with higher-resolution stills will yield better results with less processing. I also got to run the Celestron Omni eyepieces through their paces today, and they performed very well on the sun. Worth the money I spent on them (less than 30 dollars each). So what started out today is iffy, turned out to be a terrific opener for the Winchester Park sun party series this year. The site really does have great seeing for a mid-valley location, many telescope owners made the same comment. I got a few pics of the crowd and will post a link once I upload them. I estimate about 24 solar scopes were set-up today, with many guests coming by for a look at the sun.
Thanks, Chuck. OK if we put a few shots on the SLAS Facebook page? -- Joe ________________________________ From: Chuck Hards <chuck.hards@gmail.com> To: Utah Astronomy <utah-astronomy@mailman.xmission.com> Sent: Saturday, April 27, 2013 10:15 PM Subject: [Utah-astronomy] Winchester Park Sun Party 4-27-2013 What a morning. I arrived at 8:00 AM, to find the entire park full to the gills. A 5K race was about to start, and there wasn't even parking available on the street. Alpine Stringham had been there about 5 minutes already and was on the phone to others enroute. Rodger arrived shortly thereafter and made the decision to go ahead with the event and just haul his equipment from as far as he had to. Fortunately the race was about over by 9, and most of us got to park in the usual spot next to the grass. I needed power for my mount so I grabbed the first spot to open up. Seeing was terrific up until about 11:30, when I noticed it beginning to soften a bit. Still good, just not as crisp as it was earlier. Lots of activity today, prominences almost all the way around the limb and some very interesting shapes. I counted at least 5 decent flocculi and lots of large areas of plage. One large sunpot group and several smaller active regions were seen. This was the first test-run for my side-by-side setup of the PST and a white-light scope on the same equatorial mount. I started with an older Orion 80mm doublet refractor with a Thousand Oaks glass solar filter for the white side, but quickly changed to a 50mm scope with a Baader filter, which showed a much better, more contrasty image. I was pleased that both scopes had the sun centered without having to resort to shims under one of them. Alignment was spot-on. I hooked up my B&W Meade "electronic eyepiece" to both scopes and was very pleased with the detail seen on my 7" LCD monitor. The H-a view was amazing. Sunspots were plainly visible in the white-light view. The black plastic eyepiece housing soon overheated in the sun and after that I couldn't get anything but a white disk, so I retired the video and went back to visual observing only. It turns out that we didn't triple-stack the PST after all- I completely forgot to ask Bill Cowles about it, and he didn't bring it up either! The views through his scopes were just outstanding. Anybody with a three or four thousand dollar solar budget would do well to copy his setup. But for just under a grand, I'm pretty happy with the double-stacked PST. I'm going to try imaging with the PST again soon but will use a higher resolution camera next time, the electronic eyepiece uses a pretty small chip with only "webcam" resolution. OK if you plan to stack stills but for video sequences it's not fine enough. Too, starting with higher-resolution stills will yield better results with less processing. I also got to run the Celestron Omni eyepieces through their paces today, and they performed very well on the sun. Worth the money I spent on them (less than 30 dollars each). So what started out today is iffy, turned out to be a terrific opener for the Winchester Park sun party series this year. The site really does have great seeing for a mid-valley location, many telescope owners made the same comment. I got a few pics of the crowd and will post a link once I upload them. I estimate about 24 solar scopes were set-up today, with many guests coming by for a look at the sun. _______________________________________________ Utah-Astronomy mailing list http://mailman.xmission.com/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/utah-astronomy Send messages to the list to Utah-Astronomy@mailman.xmission.com The Utah-Astronomy mailing list is not affiliated with any astronomy club. To unsubscribe go to: http://mailman.xmission.com/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/utah-astronomy Then enter your email address in the space provided and click on "Unsubscribe or edit options".
Sure, Joe, if they turn out. I'll have them up tomorrow, it's way past my bedtime. Good night! On Apr 27, 2013 10:32 PM, "Joe Bauman" <josephmbauman@yahoo.com> wrote:
Thanks, Chuck. OK if we put a few shots on the SLAS Facebook page? -- Joe
________________________________ From: Chuck Hards <chuck.hards@gmail.com> To: Utah Astronomy <utah-astronomy@mailman.xmission.com> Sent: Saturday, April 27, 2013 10:15 PM Subject: [Utah-astronomy] Winchester Park Sun Party 4-27-2013
What a morning. I arrived at 8:00 AM, to find the entire park full to the gills. A 5K race was about to start, and there wasn't even parking available on the street. Alpine Stringham had been there about 5 minutes already and was on the phone to others enroute. Rodger arrived shortly thereafter and made the decision to go ahead with the event and just haul his equipment from as far as he had to. Fortunately the race was about over by 9, and most of us got to park in the usual spot next to the grass. I needed power for my mount so I grabbed the first spot to open up.
Seeing was terrific up until about 11:30, when I noticed it beginning to soften a bit. Still good, just not as crisp as it was earlier.
Lots of activity today, prominences almost all the way around the limb and some very interesting shapes. I counted at least 5 decent flocculi and lots of large areas of plage. One large sunpot group and several smaller active regions were seen.
This was the first test-run for my side-by-side setup of the PST and a white-light scope on the same equatorial mount. I started with an older Orion 80mm doublet refractor with a Thousand Oaks glass solar filter for the white side, but quickly changed to a 50mm scope with a Baader filter, which showed a much better, more contrasty image. I was pleased that both scopes had the sun centered without having to resort to shims under one of them. Alignment was spot-on.
I hooked up my B&W Meade "electronic eyepiece" to both scopes and was very pleased with the detail seen on my 7" LCD monitor. The H-a view was amazing. Sunspots were plainly visible in the white-light view. The black plastic eyepiece housing soon overheated in the sun and after that I couldn't get anything but a white disk, so I retired the video and went back to visual observing only.
It turns out that we didn't triple-stack the PST after all- I completely forgot to ask Bill Cowles about it, and he didn't bring it up either! The views through his scopes were just outstanding. Anybody with a three or four thousand dollar solar budget would do well to copy his setup. But for just under a grand, I'm pretty happy with the double-stacked PST.
I'm going to try imaging with the PST again soon but will use a higher resolution camera next time, the electronic eyepiece uses a pretty small chip with only "webcam" resolution. OK if you plan to stack stills but for video sequences it's not fine enough. Too, starting with higher-resolution stills will yield better results with less processing.
I also got to run the Celestron Omni eyepieces through their paces today, and they performed very well on the sun. Worth the money I spent on them (less than 30 dollars each).
So what started out today is iffy, turned out to be a terrific opener for the Winchester Park sun party series this year. The site really does have great seeing for a mid-valley location, many telescope owners made the same comment.
I got a few pics of the crowd and will post a link once I upload them. I estimate about 24 solar scopes were set-up today, with many guests coming by for a look at the sun. _______________________________________________ Utah-Astronomy mailing list http://mailman.xmission.com/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/utah-astronomy
Send messages to the list to Utah-Astronomy@mailman.xmission.com
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To unsubscribe go to: http://mailman.xmission.com/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/utah-astronomy Then enter your email address in the space provided and click on "Unsubscribe or edit options". _______________________________________________ Utah-Astronomy mailing list http://mailman.xmission.com/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/utah-astronomy
Send messages to the list to Utah-Astronomy@mailman.xmission.com
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Joe, here are the links to the photos. Go ahead and use them for any club media you wish, just give me a photo credit. http://i260.photobucket.com/albums/ii24/JethroTull1958/ATM/SunParty001_zps01... http://i260.photobucket.com/albums/ii24/JethroTull1958/ATM/SunParty002_zpscd... http://i260.photobucket.com/albums/ii24/JethroTull1958/ATM/SunParty006_zps91... http://i260.photobucket.com/albums/ii24/JethroTull1958/ATM/SunParty004_zpsff... http://i260.photobucket.com/albums/ii24/JethroTull1958/ATM/SunParty003_zps3e... It really was a great way to spend a Saturday morning. The PST is proving to be a pretty popular scope, there were four or five of them there. Larry and Rodger were using the club PSTs to good effect. Lots of oo's and ah's by the general-public guests who came over for a peek. Even the local constabulatory was impressed. On Sat, Apr 27, 2013 at 10:30 PM, Joe Bauman <josephmbauman@yahoo.com>wrote:
Thanks, Chuck. OK if we put a few shots on the SLAS Facebook page? -- Joe
participants (2)
-
Chuck Hards -
Joe Bauman