Comments on welder's glass as solar filter, safety
The price on the welder's glass is certainly attractive, but know that the image may be less than satisfactory. The sun will be a dark-green color, and the filter does nothing to suppress scattering. That is, you may notice a lot of bright glare surrounding the disk of the sun itself. Detail such as sunspots will be difficult to see, plague will almost certainly be totally invisible. Low-contrast details will be lost. The best view of the sun in white light will be provided by a Baader Mylar filter. Any other brand of Mylar or metal-on-glass filter is second-best. Only Baader will show the sun as white, and preserve low-contrast details. Any other filter will tint the image blue, yellow, orange, or green. And all filters must be used ahead of any optical system used; eyes, telescope, or binocular. It is also a good idea to tape-on solar filters, even those that are a snug fit. I have seen idiot bystanders attempt to remove a filter while someone else was looking through the telescope...disaster in the making. Please take all precautions if showing the sun to the general public, and don't leave your equipment unmanned for even a few seconds. Remove your Telrads and any other lens-type reflex sight; if sunlight gets into the optical train, it will melt your reticle. This happens with Telrads when they are pointed 90-degrees from the sun, with the sun above the unit. Same with Quickfinders. Chuck __________________________________________________ Do You Yahoo!? Yahoo! - Official partner of 2002 FIFA World Cup http://fifaworldcup.yahoo.com
I put my binocular filters together yesterday (sunday, 6-11) with the Baader film I picked up from Dave. It is indeed a nice white image and the sunspots were crisp. I have a Thousand Oaks glass filter for my telescope; the big difference is the color; the Baader is nicer. Thanks Chuck for all the advice, especially taping on the filters. I'm going to do that to everything I have this evening. Looks like the weather will be just right. Looking forward to Binopalooza.... Joe Borgione -------------------
The best view of the sun in white light will be provided by a Baader Mylar filter. Any other brand of Mylar or metal-on-glass filter is second-best. Only Baader will show the sun as white, and preserve low-contrast details. Any other filter will tint the image blue, yellow, orange, or green.
And all filters must be used ahead of any optical system used; eyes, telescope, or binocular.
It is also a good idea to tape-on solar filters, even those that are a snug fit. I have seen idiot bystanders attempt to remove a filter while someone else was looking through the telescope...disaster in the making. Please take all precautions if showing the sun to the general public, and don't leave your equipment unmanned for even a few seconds.
Chuck
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--- Joe Borgione <jborgion@xmission.com> wrote:
I put my binocular filters together yesterday (sunday, 6-11) with the Baader film I picked up from Dave. Looking forward to Binopalooza....
As am I! And hopefully I will be sporting a new Jethro-Tull T-shirt! Chuck __________________________________________________ Do You Yahoo!? Yahoo! - Official partner of 2002 FIFA World Cup http://fifaworldcup.yahoo.com
I'm watching the SSun now from sunny Phoenix. I have only my #14 welder's glass, but I can see one sunspot. No optical aid, just the glass and my eye. Pretty small, but definitely there! Brent --- Chuck Hards <chuckhards@yahoo.com> wrote:
The price on the welder's glass is certainly attractive, but know that the image may be less than satisfactory.
The sun will be a dark-green color, and the filter does nothing to suppress scattering. That is, you may notice a lot of bright glare surrounding the disk of the sun itself. Detail such as sunspots will be difficult to see, plague will almost certainly be totally invisible. Low-contrast details will be lost.
The best view of the sun in white light will be provided by a Baader Mylar filter. Any other brand of Mylar or metal-on-glass filter is second-best. Only Baader will show the sun as white, and preserve low-contrast details. Any other filter will tint the image blue, yellow, orange, or green.
And all filters must be used ahead of any optical system used; eyes, telescope, or binocular.
It is also a good idea to tape-on solar filters, even those that are a snug fit. I have seen idiot bystanders attempt to remove a filter while someone else was looking through the telescope...disaster in the making. Please take all precautions if showing the sun to the general public, and don't leave your equipment unmanned for even a few seconds.
Remove your Telrads and any other lens-type reflex sight; if sunlight gets into the optical train, it will melt your reticle. This happens with Telrads when they are pointed 90-degrees from the sun, with the sun above the unit. Same with Quickfinders.
Chuck
__________________________________________________ Do You Yahoo!? Yahoo! - Official partner of 2002 FIFA World Cup http://fifaworldcup.yahoo.com
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Nice, relaxed eclipse. Saw new things, used new equipment, thoroughly enjoyable. Brent Watson wrote:
No optical aid, just the glass and my eye. Pretty small, but definitely there!
There are two largish groups, Brent. Which did you see, the eastern or western? Neat eclipse. My daughter's party ran long, so we decided not to miss any eclipse by driving somewhere in the middle of it. We set-up in the backyard. Luckily, I had a better vantage point than I thought, and only the last ten minutes were lost behind the trees. As the moon approached one big sunspot, I wondered if there would be a "black drop" effect, as during second and third contacts during a Mercury transit. To my surprise, I saw the opposite. A bright ring formed a "dent" in the lunar profile, seemingly to outline the largest sunspot, until about half the spot was covered. It then disappeared. Did anyone else notice this? Did you notice the fat-crescent solar images from gaps in the leaf canopy? Waiting for first contact, I set up my 2-inch f/9 homemade refractor in the family room, and aimed it out the open door at the sun. Using eyepiece projection (with a low-cost homemade eyepiece) I projected the solar image onto the ceiling, forming a bright image about 12" across. Both large suspot groups were visible, along with several smaller groups and individual small spots. I lounged back and stared at the ceiling until I saw the first "dent" in the sun. Then on went the Mylar, and up went the binos. I used Baader material, on homemade cells (a 3" PVC coupler or cap will slide-fit perfectly over the end of a Bear 15x70mm) with the bino on my new parallelogram. What a delight to use. The kids quickly got used to the pull-down motion to adjust the height, and kept coming back to check on progress. I noticed that when the sun had slid north enough to be over the GSL, the seeing seemed to steady quite a bit. This could also easily have been a more localized event. Chuck __________________________________________________ Do You Yahoo!? Yahoo! - Official partner of 2002 FIFA World Cup http://fifaworldcup.yahoo.com
Actually, I saw both groups, but the easterners wer easier to see. The westerners came and went. Brent --- Chuck Hards <chuckhards@yahoo.com> wrote:
Nice, relaxed eclipse. Saw new things, used new equipment, thoroughly enjoyable.
Brent Watson wrote:
No optical aid, just the glass and my eye. Pretty small, but definitely there!
There are two largish groups, Brent. Which did you see, the eastern or western?
Neat eclipse. My daughter's party ran long, so we decided not to miss any eclipse by driving somewhere in the middle of it. We set-up in the backyard. Luckily, I had a better vantage point than I thought, and only the last ten minutes were lost behind the trees.
As the moon approached one big sunspot, I wondered if there would be a "black drop" effect, as during second and third contacts during a Mercury transit. To my surprise, I saw the opposite. A bright ring formed a "dent" in the lunar profile, seemingly to outline the largest sunspot, until about half the spot was covered. It then disappeared.
Did anyone else notice this?
Did you notice the fat-crescent solar images from gaps in the leaf canopy?
Waiting for first contact, I set up my 2-inch f/9 homemade refractor in the family room, and aimed it out the open door at the sun. Using eyepiece projection (with a low-cost homemade eyepiece) I projected the solar image onto the ceiling, forming a bright image about 12" across. Both large suspot groups were visible, along with several smaller groups and individual small spots. I lounged back and stared at the ceiling until I saw the first "dent" in the sun.
Then on went the Mylar, and up went the binos. I used Baader material, on homemade cells (a 3" PVC coupler or cap will slide-fit perfectly over the end of a Bear 15x70mm) with the bino on my new parallelogram. What a delight to use. The kids quickly got used to the pull-down motion to adjust the height, and kept coming back to check on progress.
I noticed that when the sun had slid north enough to be over the GSL, the seeing seemed to steady quite a bit. This could also easily have been a more localized event.
Chuck
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A great time was had by all at the Churchill Jr. High eclispe party- I guess between 50 and 75 people came by. As others have noted, some folks just walked by and never made an attempt to ask even a question let alone step up to the eyepiece. However, the vast majority of people were really stoked about what they were seeing. Several people left and came back with more family members and/or neighbors. A gentleman used his digital camera and shot a couple dozen images through one of my welding glass lenses as well as simply hand holding his camera at the eyepiece of my telescope. I'll put them on a web page and post it up sometime today (6-11). Another gentleman used his hand held binoculars to project an image on to some paper I had. I didn't notice the sunspots as Chuck noted, but it added to the fun. All told, I had my telescope & filter, binoculars & filters, welding lenses, and a few folks brought thier own filter glasses. My thanks to Joe Bauman for the article in the 'News. I didn't see it, but plenty of people mentioned it as thier invitation source. One couple had been down at the Gateway, but decided to come up to Churchill.
From what I saw on the Fox news broadcast, SLOC had quite the turn out too. Again, Patrick is a star. (All puns intended)
Joe Borgion
participants (3)
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Brent Watson -
Chuck Hards -
Joe Borgione