From: Milton Aupperle <milton@outcastsoft.com>

Date: November 8, 2009 1:37:28 PM MST

To: Astro_IIDC@yahoogroups.com

Subject: Re: [Astro_IIDC] Solar Images

Hi Jim;

Very interesting modification. From the little I read on line, the tuning of the PST and etalon is pretty critical.

http://sci.tech-archive.net/Archive/sci.astro.amateur/2007-01/msg01485.html

http://www.burnyourbonus.info/sci.astro.amateur/thread16.html

http://paulsastropics.blogspot.com/2009/04/pst-modification.html

http://paulsastropics.blogspot.com/2009/09/new-ota-for-pst-modification.html

Have you tried imaging in a 16 bit mode to see if you can recored both surface details and prominences in one shot (stretched in post stacking).

PS:

And the weather has sucked lately. My last imaging session was September 27 and my skies have been terrible since. If it isn't cold (-16°C) and snowing, it's warm and windy (to 95 kmph). And if it's normal temperatures, it's overcast. The only constant thing is that I have horrible high altitude turbulence from the Jet stream and alternating Chinook warm and Arctic cold fronts rolling through.

TTYL..

Milton Aupperle

On 8-Nov-09, at 11:49 AM, jimchung2338 wrote:

The really lousy weather around Toronto has made me satisfy my addiction by turning to astro themed projects.  I recently performed a PST mod by placing the PST body and etalon into a larger f/10 scope.  This was you benefit from the much larger resolving aperture vs the original 40mm aperture of the PST.  Here's an initial image:

http://tech.groups.yahoo.com/group/Astro_IIDC/files/Solar/PstModSun.jpg

This is what the modded PST looks like:

http://tech.groups.yahoo.com/group/Astro_IIDC/files/Other/Traveler.jpg

The next step is to remove the etalon and BF5 filter from the PST body and installed them into the optical train with some adaptors and diagonal.  The PST has a really lousy prism that degrades the image.

Jim