What's the Best Solar Filter? 

yeah NO ONE DOES THAT, NO ONE

Is it possible to see solar detail (flares, promences) with the simple “end cap” filter he showed first? I hate to spend $2000 on a dedicated solar telescope.

CaK is on my list as well. The Lunt 1800 is the one I will be picking up. Scott

I think, that Coronado PST is good enough :) Solar Max costs too much and it's almost the PST, only with some upgrades.

How wide of a band is your h-alpha filter? Are the cheaper 32nm wide ones worth getting?

@@jasonmcintosh2632 I have the Coronado PST with the double stack H Alpha filter on it. It's a decent entry level telescope and enough to see filaments, flares, and some hints of granularity, but I do eventually want to upgrade to a Lunt 60mm double stack as my final solar telescope. That should be a decent all around solar telescope and a bit more capable than my current setup, but also a bit pricier.

Yeah, the quark is definitely on my wishlist, I'll hopefully have one here pretty soon where I can post an updated video using it.

As far as camera's I've been using the LPI-G Advanced camera, and it's been amazing, Orion has been having sales on them. But I've been extremely happy with the quality of the videos that I've used to stack with into a final image... If you go to my Instagram, you can see examples of what I've gotten using this camera... Most if not all my Planetary images are taken using this camera.

The only way you could photograph with a DSLR would need to get a T-ring and M42 to 1.25" Telescope Adapter. but you will get much better results if you invest in a small CCD camera. I did a how-to video on one of these cameras, DSLRS are amazing for deep sky imaging, but planets, moon and Sun I reccomend a CCD, or CMOS Dedicated Astrocam ru-vid.com/video/%D0%B2%D0%B8%D0%B4%D0%B5%D0%BE-NkGYaMtsjv8.html

What was the condition of the filter? If the filter was scratched or damaged it might not protected you appropriately. You should have your eyes checked by a doctor to determine if you have retinal damage.

The views between these two scopes is very different, since the Meade has a double stacked etalons, and the Lunt is Single stacked. Also the Meade is a 70mm scope, while the lunt is 50mm. That being said, I would chose the Meade scope over the Lunt just for those differences, and the Solarmax III allows three ways to tune the halpha light spectrum, while the Lunt only has one. The best way to do a true comparison would be to put two scopes (Lunt vs Meade) equal in specifications and accessories to the test. But price is also a huge factor too, the Lunt I got used while the Meade I got new. If you're seriously thinking about investing in a solar telescope, I would try to attend a Solar party with other astronomers that might have both a Meade and Lunt scopes at the party to see which one performs better, but I for one would choose Meade.

I have a lunt 102 mm ha solar scope and 1.25 in b/w cc'd camera and have taken some great pictures of the sun

Good question, I've used a few different ones, my favorite I use for 1.25 eyepieces is this one. It's worked the best for me. agenaastro.com/meade-smart-phone-adapter-608007.html

Thank you for your reply. I will have to try. I have the double stack 15mm. Amazing detail on the surface. Super high contrast. I hope to get some good shots with the cell. 👍

Unfortunately you can not without causing damage to your telescope. The mirrors in reflecting telescopes will absorb the energy from the Sun. The Herschel wedges are recommended to be used on refractor telescopes only.

You cannot do a Prime focus on the scope and have it look good. I have tried in the past to do a prime focus with my Astro-modified D600, and while I can achieve focus, the lack of the light filtering is too great. It's terrible in fact, since as you pointed out, that you would be removing part of the filtering system. As far as the purpose for the filters being setup the way they are, the manufacture designed the scope that way, so you could remove the filters and use the scope as a regular night time scope as well.

The filter in front of the telescope is a Fabry-Pérot interferometer, also known as etalon. It transmits light only in very narrow bands which look like lines in a spectroscope, but there are many of these lines in regular distances in the spectrum. The transmission of the blocking filter in the diagonal is less narrower, but narrow enough that only one of the "lines" of the etalon can pass - and that is the H-alpha line.

Both are great options, while my pressure tuned scope is simple enough, I actually prefer the tilt tuner since I can generally achieve a more precise balance with tuning for both the Chromoshphere and Prominence Detail. The tilt tuning is also nice on smaller mounts, I'm pretty limited with my pressure tuner since I have to crank down the piston, it shakes the whole view of the sun when doing it on smaller mounts. Hope some of these insights help.

Keele Photography thank you for the reply , yes iit makes sence that with the pressure tuner one will have more shake on the mount

I could not quite afford the Lunt 50 double stacked, but could quite manage to get the Coronado PST double stacked. I don't know if Lunt is better, and I don't care. I bought what I could afford and so far I'm enjoying my H-Alpha experience with the Coronado PST double stack. Definitely well worth the outrageous price as compared to regular telescopes, as a white light filter will never give you the level of detail a dedicated solar telescope will.

Regular eyepieces will work, the best eyepiece I have ever used on one of these scopes was a Zoom eyepiece, the other came with my Coronado in the box, and it works pretty well. I actually found the Luminos 10mm Eyepiece works pretty good as well.

Keele Photography thank you again, I just got the solarmax iii just like yours in a good deal and was observing the sun today from CA. USA and was amazing solar flares, sun spots, it was very active

Thank you!

Its going to be red, trying to photograph using a cellphone is going to appear redish pink... the other colors are generally only like that after processing.

@@rkeele82 Nice! What do you recommend for tripod and 12mm eyepiece? How about a camera link to a pc?

Where did you buy this?

Yes, it should. There are some mylar filters that will work too, but the glass filters are much nicer and more durable.

Old comment but I'll bite anyways. That's a 90mm f/10ish refractor yes? Theoretically you could get a 1.25" solar wedge for it, but there's a lot of plastic in the design and I'd be concerned about melting the focuser. A mylar film filter will be inexpensive and good to get you going. I'm sure by now you've either figured that out or gotten a different telescope, but someone else with a similar scope may see these words and go from there.

If you can get and afford an 80 mm etalon, go for it. Otherwise buy a smaller one and adapt it. The blocking filter should have 6 mm clear aperture at least, so I would suggest a BF10 when choosing Coronado or a 1200 blocking filter when choosing Lunt. The 600 is meant for telescopes up to 600 mm focal length, but that might be a bit too small of a margin. It also makes very accurate tracking necessary. An alternative to the combination of etalon and blocking filter would be a Daystar Quark, containing both and additionally a strong Barlow lens.

You can, but there's a far better product out now for use with a DSLR, Daystar filters makes a really amazing one.

You generally only want to only use a wedge on a refractor, reflectors will build up too much heat without a front element ERF... so I guess if you did get an ERF from somewhere like daystar filters, you could use a wedge, though I have never tried it myself.

@@rkeele82 thanks man

Correct... and as long as you have your scope tracking the Sun it shouldn't heat up too much as the heat will be transferred into the backplate of the wedge. There's always a chance of something getting damaged, but the way things are designed, the wedge passes only 1% of the total light into your eyepiece, and so as long as the Prism is good, you should be too. I have never had a problem with mine.

@@rkeele82 Thanks for the great video and the rapid response!

Thanks for your help, and the quick response.

NO. Refractors only.

Buy Seymour filter and cut it yourself

Seymour filter sheet

I thought and tried the same thing, but didn't see anything in the h-alpha wavelength visually or photographically.

Keele Photography - you mean there was no additional detail?

@@wanderingquestions7501 Yes, sorry for the confusion.

About 20mm ;) J/k In all seriousness the 90mm Solar Max 2 is one of the nicest h-alpha telescopes I have photographed the sun with, however I will say that with most USB astro cameras you can't capture a full disc of the sun with that high of power. Visually there's not a huge different, other than a little more contrast, but one thing said for the Solar Max 3 double stack is that you can adjust the h-alpha wavelength for finer tuning than other solar telescopes, and that makes a huge difference.

90mm scope...double stacked...you won't get much change from USD 6k...

This wouldn't work with a H-alpha solar filter, as th ND5 front filter blocks the 99.999% of every part of the spectrum, including H-alpha. Observing in H-alpha works differently. If you have a larger aperture, some systems need an energy rejection filter (Schott RG630 or interference type) in front of the telescope, while systems with the etalon in front of the telescope don't. Drawback of the latter: They become _very_ expensive with larger apertures.

I made this video a few years ago, prices can change sometimes.

Says someone who has no content

@@rkeele82 Well jackass, you don't need to be a brain surgeon to know that jabbing one with a scalpel isn't the right way to do brain surgery. You never even mentioned one of the filters you had on display, you didn't even answer your own question of the title, and you left out several other options for Solar such as D-ERF etc. You also fan boy over the meade even though you can also double stack (which you didn't mention) the lunt... lunt is also cheaper, and has a better quality right now. as well as more option. The video was incomplete and poorly done, I have no content on this account. But nice assumption that you think I may or may not have a channel, active or otherwise as if it matters to judge your shitty video lmfao.