Inside Tucson Business Article

Inside Tucson Business Magazine is a local business oriented weekly publication in Tucson.

They recently came out for an interview and a chance to look thru some of the Lunt Solar scopes. Here is the beginning of the article.....

"Of all the beauty in nature that people take notice of in a day, the largest thing in our solar system may be the most ignored: the sun.

Mothers have always warned their children not to look directly into the sun – and for good reason.
In all of its massive power and size the light given off by the huge burning ball of gas is enough to cause serious eye damage.

For those who don’t want listen to their moms’ advice, Lunt Solar Systems is happy to oblige......."

To read the entire article click here: www.azbiz.com

Image courtesy of Eduard Garcia..

Image by Eduard Garcia-Ribera

This image is one a few that were sent in by Eduard Garcia-Ribera a few days ago.

Our thanks goes out to Eduard for providing excellent images taken thru an LS100T.

Many may recognize this active region of just a short while ago. We certainly hope that the images will continue to be sent in as the Sun becomes more and more active..

To see more images by Eduard and/or to submit your own images for our photo gallery please visit the Lunt Solar Image Gallery at http://luntsolarsystems.com/galleries.html

We look forward to, and really appreciate, these amazing contributions... Thanks!

Nice Lift Off Today

We're back in the office !!!

I hope everyone had a chance to view the Sun at would be about 2:30 thru 3:30PM (Arizona Time).

A very nice prominence has been evolving all day, swirling and changing shapes. I have been testing since early this morning and have really enjoyed watching the transformations. I suspect that this is a precursor to an active region that is going to be rotating around in the next day or so :)

At about 3:oopm, it lifted off the surface and continued to move further and further away. I was amazed at how far it was from the Sun's surface, and yet was still very bright.

Upon setting up an LS60T/PT, I was able to see why.

An extremely thin tail was still "feeding" the cloud from the surface. By rotating the PT, you could actually follow the tail from the surface of the Sun thru the sky and into the suspended cloud of gas.

At 3:30pm I noted that the tail had broken, and as you would suspect, the gas cooled quickly.

It is certainly a reminder of the "good old days" that are quickly coming back, and we are all looking forward to the decade of 2010 which will be better known as the decade of Solar Maximum..

Lots of blogs to get entered. I am just finishing up the Community Area of the new site and will be importing the current blogs into the new format.

Some very exciting news is brewing for the solar enthusiast, so keep posted to the news and events section which will now be updated every few days..

NEAF shirt spotted in Peru!!

I'll have to get Rikki to do a little write up about what it's like living in Peru.

Here is an image of Rikki with Jesus, the guy who drives her too and from "work" every day.

Is that a NEAF shirt that Jesus is wearing??

As some people know, Rikki lives in Peru. She runs the Lunt office from a small office in the town near where she lives. It must be nice to be chauffeured to and from work.

When I get into the office in the morning, I see the mouse cursor on her virtual terminal moving around. She uses an internet based program to chat with Jen in the office all day for free!! You know she's here all day, but you never see her...

I won't say that it hasn't been without it's small glitches, but I have to say that the virtual commuting really works even over thousands of miles to a developing country..

What else does Rikki do in Peru and how did we get this worked out?? I'll have to get her write up a little blog and send in some pics..

Stay tuned..

Great Activity Today !!!

Tucson, Arizona has cooled some from last week. One week ago today it was 90 degrees, today we are in the low 70s.. oooh that's chilly...

Along with the cooled temps has come some nice transparent skies. I was testing today and I am very delighted to see several good active areas and as many as 4-5 small developing areas. In addition there are filaments on the surface.. woooHooo!

I hope you get a chance to get outside and view, it's very nice to see the significant increase in activity over the last few months..

Let me know what you see..

First Week of November (Last Part)

As of November 1st we officially began to move into our new expanded facilities next door. Our landlord, Steve, has been nice enough to let us store our cases, shipping containers etc. over there for the last few months until the facilities were ready. The new facilities increased our square footage by about another 40%.

The expansion incudes a few more offices, a nice education/AV area with kitchen and restrooms, and in mid area a nice big fully climate controlled room for our upcoming coating facilities with large double doors to our current assembly area. The back of the area has been heated and cooled, but is currently used as a main storage area. During the buildout of our current area, we had the fore thought to put 800 Amps of 3 phase power in, so the new area has plenty of juice to keep us going.

I'll have to get some pictures up, but it's hard to believe that we first moved in to the current building in February of 2008. The building had a small kitchen, and a lobby. There were NO bathroom facilities. (We made friends with the neighbors very quickly ;). The first 2 Continuous Polishers were working in the kitchen area on very long extension cords. I had an electric heater on one wall and an air conditioner on the other, both fighting to keep the un-insulated room at +/-1 degree.

6 months later we were able to move out of the kitchen and populate the new building just in time for our open house..

14 months later we are still expanding and I am still working very hard to increase our capacity to meet the ever growing demand.

Outreach in Riverside, CA

I wanted to share my experience with this new gear.

I don't know what Andy does when he matches this scopes and filters up but I am just completely blown away by the views with the new LS60THa scope and my original LS50FHa filter. This set up starts to mimics views I had years back with a buddies older Coronado Solarmax 90 filter on a TV101 scope! I knew double stacking was the way to go but seeing it real time with this latest technology really reinforces it.

I got first sunlight Saturday morning and could see so much detail on a new emerging active region that day. The bright spot with detailed twisting was very easy to see and study. The orange peel was so intense that the sun's globe was starting to show the classic 3D quality of truly high end H-Alpha rigs. And, amazingly, the double stack even at 50mm aperture was still able to show the prominences extremely well even while showing all this surface detail. How can this be!!? Most smaller aperture double stack H-Alpha filters and scopes in the past just showed higher surface detail at the strong expense of easily seen edge detail. Not both at the same time. This little additional gift to the views is just more iceing on the solar cake.

Using the scope and filter set up at the large STEP Conference outreach here in Riverside for the last two days presented easily seen surface detail for every single student and teacher. Every single one. No guessing. There was never any......"well I see it sort of but I'm not sure". Even the younger children could view the orange peel, filaments and active regions clearly. Lots of smiles or "that's so cool!" or "that's really our sun? Are you kidding me?....awwwwesome!!"

I now have the ultimate solar outreach tool that can be use to share our star with many thousands of the public of all ages over the years. I have tools to do serious outreach all day long. Not just at night. For an outreach junkie like me this is true Nirvana.
I thank all of you guys involved at Lunt Solar Systems for bringing this company to market. You folks really are continuing the vision of bringing H-Alpha observing to the masses. All I can say is your service and products speak for themselves.

.....Thanks for these very kind words, we look forward to hearing about ongoing outreach from Riverside and in your area.....

Thanks again,
P. Agins
Riverside Astronomical Society
Outreach program

First Week of November (Part 1)

The first week of November has flown by. A week ago today we were getting ready for Holloween night, it'll be Thanksgiving before you know it!!.

Testing, new products, and website were the projects of the week.

The image at left is the New LS152T/PT. This is currently the largest dedicated telescope that we manufacture. This is a working prototype and was on display at PATS. It had been my intention to take it outside on the Sunday, but the mount that I was going to borrow was sold on Saturday. I did try the mount it was displayed on, but that was a drop waiting to happen.

The internal lens sets for the system are almost finished. The prototype lenses were "off the shelf" and weren't quite optimized for the system proviving only about a 70% sweetspot in the center of field. The production lenses have been designed to the optical system. They are also slightly larger than the prototype given more aperture to the beam.

The LS152 contains an unobstructed 60mm HR (high resolution) etalon. This is a new etalon design and provides for high signal to noise ratio which greatly darkens that background allowing for stunning contrast on edge details.

I have already had one person ask about the unobstructed 60mm, and before the questions are raised and the assumptions made in other forums, I will state that we will not be introducing the LS60F until Summer of 2010. Due to the very high demand for the other products, we will not be tooling this particular size at the expense of current production. Our LS60F production is currently limited to the LS152T, and takes the place of the production schedule for the LS200T.

The estimated US$ retail for this instrument is $7,495.00 (this does NOT include the CaK module). For those that have the LS200T on order you will be receiving the LS152T at no additional cost. If you purchased the CaK option for the LS200T you will also be receiving that at no additional cost. As you know, the LS200T was introduced at 5k. It was the intention to increase this price once the system was shipping and had good reviews. As I will explain in another post, the LS200T could never meet both the performance requirements that I had set for it, while also meeting the strict safety requirements. The trade offs were leading to unacceptable compromizes on both sides. Safety will always be of the highest priority to ANY solar product.

For those that choose to accept the exchange, I promise that you will be receiving a solar system that exceeds my expectaions for what the LS200T was going to do. By defualt the delays have allowed for the incorporation of a 60mm etalon instead of a 50mm. The new HR (high resolution) coatings will be incorporated standard, and the value of the package itself will provide a good return on investment should you ever choose to sell.

For those that cannot accept the exchange, we will refund any deposit in full.

Pressure vs Doppler Shift (Part 3)

The diagram at left shows the system has been fully pressurized. This pressure is equivalent to about a 12,000ft altitude change.
The air inside the sealed chamber has been compressed due to the reduced volume. As a result the refractive index of the air has increased and caused the CWL of the etalon to move to the blue or high energy side of the Hydrogen wavelength.

Due to the fact that there is no tilt involved, the image field remains flat and very precise.

Traditional tilting allows the Doppler shifting across the field in a plane perpendicular to the axis of light. The user can see a change to the image that allows for the viewing of proms and then filaments. The optimum position is when the proms and surface are both fairly detailed. Overtilting will tighten the bandpass but will also produce a banding effect. The resolution under the band is higher, but at the expense of the entire field of view.

People often feel that the entire field should be as good as the area created under the band. If this were possible, the systems would be spec'd at a much lower bandpass. If a band occurs, the system has probably been over attenuated.

True Doppler Tuning allows for a shift into and away from the user. Adding a 3D component to the viewing experience.
While it has minimal effect on proms due to their being at the edge of the disk, it does have an effect on filaments and active regions.
While looking at a filament at the center of the Sun the user has the ability to Doppler shift from the base of the filament to the tip, following the filament thru it's structure toward you and away from you. Allowing for enhanced visual and imaging capability for the observer as well as a research tool for the avid hobbyist.
The tuning system provides an order of magnitude more precision to the tuning of the desired features.

We are working on designs to the LS100F and the LS100T/Na utilizing the same technology.
The LS100F will be remotely operated for those that have this filter mounted on a long FL scope and do not have 4ft long arms.
We are currently manufacturing the LS60T and the LS100T via this technology.
The LS60T is fully upgradeable to the new Pressure Tune System at any time. However, it does require a return to the factory.

End of Part 3

Pressure vs Doppler Shift (Part 2)

The diagram shown at left indicates that the air pressure inside the sealed chamber has been increased. At this point the CWL of the bandpass is at 656.28nm. At this position we are looking at the Hydrogen-alpha line and the energy associated with that wavelength.

The sealing of the cavity is done via the collimating and refocus lens so that the etalon itself is isolated from differential pressure.
The piston applies from zero to a pressure that is equivalent to taking an etalon from -500ft to +12,000ft above sea level.
This has the added benefit of making the etalon system altitude insensitive.

In addition the etalon can be used from -50 to +200 degrees Celsius due to the fact that the tuning can compensate for the very small changes that heat would have on the "feet" of the etalon.

I have gone into great detail in prior posts regarding the compromises of tilting internal to a telescope. Only very small adjustments to the tilt of an etalon can be done otherwise the etalon system will begin to suffer from the off axis rays of the re-collimated beam.
People have noted that in internal tilt systems the CWL is very sensitive to even small adjustments of the tilt wheel.
By removing the need for tilt we have placed the etalon in the most optimized position possible.
We install a very accurately tuned etalon. This etalon is tuned to the red side of the CWL. Given that it is already tuned to the red, the user has the ability to shift the tune of the CWL to the Hydrogen-alpha line and then Doppler tune to the blue or back thru to the red.

Due to the fact that there is no tilt involved, the image field remains flat and very precise.

End of Part 2

Pressure vs Doppler Shift (Part 1)

Lunt Solar Systems recently introduced the new Pressure Tune system, or Doppler True Tuning system.

The image at left shows the basic outline of this system. The internal etalon is at ambient pressure. The tuning of the etalon is slightly low, putting the Center Wavelength (CWL) at the red wing of the Hydrogen line. This provides a view of less energetic features in the Chromosphere.

How does it work and what does it do?

The system works because the etalons used in the current Lunt designs are air spaced. These air spaced etalons have been typically tuned to the Hydrogen-alpha line via several mechanisms.

The first is the spacing of the air gap between the high reflective surfaces of the ultra flat plates. By changing the spacing, you change the CWL. The distance of this spacing is generally held constant because the refractive index of the medium between the plates (air) is relatively stable at ~1.
The center wavelength can be manipulated from there by slight tilting of the etalon. This changes the angle of the light at the interface of the high reflector/air layer, having the effect of moving the center wavelength toward the blue.

Slight changes in barometric pressure and/or a change in altitude will effect the CWL due to the change in refractive index of the spacer layer.
These changes can be compensated for by additional tilting provided that the etalon is tuned to accomodate those changes.
Taking an etalon that was tuned at 100ft to 10,000ft would certainly not be within that range.

In the past I have manufactured sealed etalon systems for space flight.
These etalon systems were designed to work in a sealed vacuum. As a result they were manufactured as very highly tuned etalons. By placing them under vacuum, the tuning lowered . Tuning was done to ensure that at full vacuum the etalon was on band.
Additional fine tuning from there was done via heat due to the fact that the vacuum could not be adjusted.

Our technology utilizes air pressure and not vacuum.

End of part 1

R&D Projects at Lunt Solar Part 1

It's probably doesn't come as any surprise that Lunt Solar Systems LLC is involved in R&D projects outside the field of Solar Filters and Telescopes.
But it is because of our highly technical and specialized skills that we are often asked to develop unique optical elements that fall within our capabilities and my interests.
Some of these R&D programs are confidencial. Some of the ongoing projects are not, and may not only be of interest, but they may encourage readers to suggest other uses for these technologies.

One of our more recent projects has been the developement of a novel solid etalon design.
The intial concept was for the design of an ulta thin, ultra stable, ultra precise, and ultra narrow bandpass micro etalon.

The project's scope of work consisted of manufacturing a solid etalon that was approximately 0.3mm thick (0.012") at the Hydrogen-alpha line.
Multiple matched etalons needed to be produced. The desired size was 4mm x 4mm.
The Hydrogn-alpha emission line was chosen due to our knowledge of manufacturing at that specific wavelength. However, Hydrogen-alpha is not the desired wavelength of the finished product.

The results have been extremely succesful.

At Lunt Solar we produced what can essencially be referred to as a wafer etalon.
The solid etalon was manufactured from a 80mm piece of low expansion UV grade material. (not zero expansion).
The "spacer" layer was polished to 0.3mm thick and send out for testing prior to further work. We needed to show verification of the spacer layer's precision prior to going to the next step.

Results:

The Wafer was first tested for surface flatness. Surface flatness was not the concern given that the etalon would be used in transmission.
It was the Transmitted Wavefront that was specified.

As you can imagine the wafer did suffer from some surface error due to being held in a fixture.

The surface flatness was measured at 1/6th of a wave, some of that coming from astigmatism due to the fixture point.
Power was the major contributing factor to this error due to the method of manufacture.

The Transmitted wavefront results were very encouraging.
The interferometer showed a peak to valley error over 75mm (the aperture of the system) of 1/61th wave at 532nm. The RMS being better than 1/250th wave (the limit of the test system).
This test was over 75mm. The system was not capable of realizing a measurement over 4mm aperture, and the engineer was not able to speculate just what that result would be could it even be measured.

These results were followed by some interesting conversations with the test facility who wanted to know how we had tested the wafer ourselves.
For those that have visited Lunt Solar in Tucson, you will know that I test ALL optics for flatness by eye only.

The wafer was sent out for coating via a low temperature, ion assisted process. The wafer was coated on both surfaces with what I now refer to as the new hybrid high reflector.
Some initial tests needed to be done to assure a "tune" at the desired wavelength.
In this case we tuned slightly low of Hydrogen-alpha in order to utilize the standard method of heat to bring the etalon accurately on band.

The end result was a pellicle wafer of about 80mm diameter. Given the highest degree of precision for the entire etalon, we could now be assured of matching etalons of 4mm x 4mm after the wafer had been diced.

The net result as far as specifications go are as follows:

Bandpass: 0.2 Angstroms
Free Spectral Range: 11 Angstroms
Finesse: 27

A few technology applications immediately come to mind given the controllable FSR and the narrow bandpass. I would certainly like to hear your thoughts on possible applications as well.

I am obviously excited about the prospect of getting this system assembled into the back end of a SCT telescope very soon. The wider acceptance angle of this design vs a conventional higher index spacer material will make the modification to existing SCTs in the market fairly simple and compact.
The fact that the etalon itself is thin and has little mass will allow for rapid temperature change and stabilization.
The use of the proven materials will allow for a mass-produceable 0.2 Angstrom bandpass system with a single etalon. I can hear the calls for a double stack system already...

Moving outside my area of expertise and free thinking for a moment...

The product is of a robust solid design and the CWL of the system can be fixed to a specific wavelength or tuneable.
The thickness of the system lends itself well to the bonding to CCDs. Maybe multiple etalons can be bonded to a single CCD to provide a chemical signature detector?
I have thought about it's use in applications such as ionized gas/chemical detection for a while.

Used in these applications the signal to background noise ratio would be of huge advantage, eliminating all background noise and providing >90% T at the desired wavelengths.

We provide 0.5A bandpass looking directly at the Sun. Ambient daylight would be of no issue.

Ancillary light sources such as laser or short wavelengths could be used to further excite the desired compounds?
Are there military applications for ionized gas/chemical detection for munitions, gunfire etc?? The addition of signature trace elements to munitions that can be optically traced?

Other applications may include laser line stabilization, optical fiber multiplexing, etc...

This is just one of our current R&D projects. It is thanks to this project and a few others which I will outline in another blog that we are rapidly improving the performance of our core products. Success and failure though our ongoing research projects are already seeing a positve impact on the contrast and resolution of even our most basic systems..

Upcoming products will focus on enhanced performance and the ability to accessorize systems for use as educational tools.

I encourage your feedback and comments and thank you for reading.