Well... WOW!!!
After some very windy past weekdays (too windy to view!), our central star beckoned me to take a peek...
I will sound like a bit of a broken record for those who've followed my observation this past year, but: I still get blown away by this f/5.9 Achromat in solar service! Just nuts...
Started at ~70X with my Lacerta 2" Brewster Angle Solar wedge this morning, with B+W polarizer and ISB (InSkyBooks') Sodium 589nm, 9-10nm BW sodium filter...
BAM! That big spot group had a wealth of detail provided- Within AR14079's several main umbrae was what I term the "keyhole", which morphed quite a bit during the 3h+ session this morning. Initially, the area was a bit more "blank" with paler features within, but over even 1h these began to widen, deepen, and even periodically merge (as extensions of/with) the light bridges surrounding the area. Also, many pores or smaller spots in an "archipelago" along the southern portions of 14079, with darker regions between the spots (pseudo-penumbrae?) And surrounding the region. Very neat.
Bumped to 82X/1o view for a bit - seeing went for a between Pickering 8-9/10 for about 3 minutes at a time, with periods around 6/10 for 5 minute gaps... and to be honest, details were hitting me so much I had a time of it processing them at times! Besides digging into 14079, I enjoyed a wealth of granular structures all around the disk, and nice plage to within the inner 25% of he disk. (Later, I switched to my C2 SWAN filter, and it showed those plage and granular regions slightly better, and different features were available, like darker shaded cool areas about the S chain of small spots in 14079, and really nice structure in the 14076 region and throughout the trailing limb).
There was a region near mid disk, somewhat isolated from the main groups, that had between 3-5 spots, three of these were small but easy to see. There was amazing cooler shading structure between the two main ones in the S of the area that showed some penumbral formation between the spots. Subtle, but there, and really visible in the C2 SWAN filter. NICE! The trick using these types of NB filters is to TUNE the brightness to optimize contrast - a small focal tweak and... BAM! the detail just pops when seeing steadies!
I have to say again that at 800 Euro (was on a pre-Christmas sale) which I paid for this late 2023, this scope has been THE best solar observing kit for the money - EVER! I know that things are challenging now esp. for folks in the US, but these TS152RFTs just scream at solar Mg/Na wavelengths, and I have seen one French Amateur using one for Ha service and it was doing an amazing job; just a well-made achromat, which can truly shine in NB visual/AP.
During the "keyhole" observing, one of the many other structural changes seen over 2.5h or so in the 14079region was penumbral morphological changes within the Umbra-Penumbral boundaries, esp. on the leading upper section's spot. Seeing bridge openings into the keyhole, with extra cool areas showing over time as extensions of this area was superb! The penumbral region esp. on the northern portions, was so "featherlike" it reminded me of iron filings in a magnet (technically not too far from this lol!). Just sliver thin! Changes in length, width, and frontal edge areas were fantastic to watch in real-time. What a wonderful morning session!
Anyway - Still reviewing the notes - LOTS of stuff seen today! The Lacerta 2" wedge also did superbly with this filter system. Very smooth and excellent tuning of the image brightness - +/- 5 degree rotation from main setting was often all that was needed. I have admittedly difficulty describing some of the details seen because I do not see this in CF shots or WL shots, either. WAY more seen during best seeing.
CS! good sun...
Darren
