Photo above is a long exposure of me looking at the moon through the Vixen Binocular Telescope.
I was looking up the Lunt Solar scope that we have in the observatory on the OPT site. Ocean Pacific Telescope is one dealer that sells these and other telescopes. There are more expensive telescopes out there of course, but the 35mm Lunt Solar scope is a pretty nice telescope for solar viewing. Bigger Hydrogen Alpha setups are great and provide more detail. But a 60mm solar scope of this type could be in the $3500 range. And a 100mm in the $7000 to $8000 range. You can buy hydrogen alpha filters and spend nearly $8,000 to put a filter on a larger telescope. Often these filters may include a blocking filter and a special adapter that matches it from the same manufacturer, for instance Daystar makes some of these packages. You could easily spend $10,000 for a filter set for a larger telescope. We even have a member who has a filter set that would likely cost in the $8,000 range in our club. He states this gives much more detailed solar views than you'll see in a typical small solar hydrogen alpha telescope.
Many astronomers have small solar telescopes, one very popular one being the PST or Personal Solar Telescope. These cost about $500. You can get "dual filters" for the front of these PST instruments and that could push the cost over $1000.
But what about the 35mm dual filter Lunt setup? It's really nice, and after looking through it, that to me would be the minimum personal solar telescope I'd want, or something more expensive. Some of the photos on the Nasa site from the earth are through solar telescopes that are 60mm or larger. It's difficult to imagine taking a photo that was published through a smaller solar telescope. Is a telescope for viewing the sun worth the price? Well it depends on the astronomer I suppose. But considering it's easier to look at the sun during normal hours than stay up late to look at some faint object that might be affected by haze, it's clear that a lot of people find solar viewing a great pursuit.
In looking at the Lunt, meaning the exact same one we have in the observatory, one thing becomes very interesting and clear. The telescope is small and portable. But it's also not very wide. It's narrow enough to "mount in a binocular configuration". This makes a personal solar telescope purchase of the exact same model very interesting from my own perspective. Because it means there might be a chance to make a mount that would hold one I purchased with one from the observatory, for viewing at the Lincoln Park Site. It would be very interesting from my perspective, to pull up with a matching Lunt Solar scope with a mount and pull the Lunt from the observatory for a temporary use outside on a separate binocular mount. I have seen the effect that binocular viewing can have in enhancing the moon watching experience. I'd like to experience binocular or stereo viewing of the SUN through a really nice setup.
This is perhaps the "next buying temptation". But of course I'd have to be careful and probably go over the alternate configuration setup for use at the observatory with the club and the school system. I think it's a possibility, but I'm not sure how long it will be before I order a Solar scope to test it out. (Then again I could get a second Lunt without a mounting bracket or eyepiece even cheaper. I have dual eyepieces already for the binocular telescope setup.) Maybe I could fabricate the binocular setup and get into stereo solar viewing for about $1100 without figuring the cost of the mount. It's tempting to think about.
One thing to consider when solar viewing is the sun beating down on you as you watch and that heating you up and making the view uncomfortable as well. So some kind of make shift shielding is also a nice thing to plan for. In the observatory we can use the shutter to block out the sunlight from the viewer most of the time and just allow the sun to peek past the shutter into the Lunt mounted on the mount. With a Binocular setup, things would be a little more complicated for the shielding.
Okay, enough late night thinking about solar scope purchases, time to get some sleep. . . it's cloudy out.
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