The Dutch Observatory

Clear and stable skies with good seeing.  Solar Activity remains Very Low.  Today is Spotless Day 258.  A small filament as well as some prominences could be observed in Ha around the solar disk.  A new faculae was visible at the eastern limb.  For the rest the Sun looks quiet.

A few clouds cleared and the seeing was above average. Solar Activity is Very Low and we only see a few filaments and small proms in Ha.  Today’s images include full disk images in the three wavelengths as well as close ups of the Western limb to see how the remnants from AR2716 look like in different wavelengths  before they turn to the far side of the sun.

Clear and great seeing conditions.  Today is also where I gave my repaired SM40 a new run.  Solar Activity is Very Low with no flares in a while.  In Ha there were a few filaments near the NW limb and some faint filaments near the NE limb. The Sun was quiet in the other wavelengths.  Today again full disk images in the three wavelengths and close ups in Ha and CaK.

Transparency was not good this morning resulting in below average seeing conditions.  Another Spotless Day with Very Low solar activity.  A real quiet Sun today.  The good news is that late this morning UPS dropped off my SM40 which has been for 8 weeks at Meade for repairs to the blocking filter.  So hopefully tomorrow I get a chance to test the results of the repair.  Am crossing my fingers. Today full disk images with an additional close up of the Western limb in CaK.

Today a correction to yesterday’s post.  The Sun showed a small sunspot from approx. 7/20 1500 UT until 7/21 2300 UT, which NOAA’s SWPC reported in their 0330 UT report on 7/22.  This marks yesterday as the end of a spotless spree and not as spotless day 252 as I reported.  The spot AR2716, covering 10 millionths,  lasted only one day.  So since today’s conditions did not allow me to observe, I spend the time making an annotated animation of the life of AR2716, cropping out the area of the spot using NOAA’s image data.  Click the thumbnail below to see the 3 second animation of AR2716 from birth during the afternoon of 7/20, until it disappeared just before midnight on 7/21. (It might take a little time to load the 7MB animation) The frames in the animation are in reality separated by approx. 1 hour each.  It is interesting to see how the spot generates a few pores which drift away from the central spot during the decay.

Clear skies with good seeing.  Solar Activity remains Very Low on spotless day 252.  The plage we followed a few days ago has turned to the far side of the Sun and for the rest, the Sun is pretty quiet.  Today’s images include full disk images and close ups of the center of the solar disk in CaK and 540nm, showing that even in a 80mm scope one can see the granulation on the solar surface.

Lots of con-trails this morning with average seeing.  Solar Activity is Very Low with no sunspots at spotless day 249.  The plage visible in CaK is approaching the Western Limb so in a few days it will be gone.  The faculae associated with it in 540nm can be seen in the processed full disk image, although I did not make a close up of it.  This is the 22nd spotless day in this series since 6/27, the last day we recorded a sunspot.

Below average seeing today.  The Solar Activity remains Very Low.  Today is spotless day 248 and I am including a close up of the plage near the western limb. For the rest there is not much to see on the sun today.

Broken clouds this morning with bad seeing.  After 5 days I was able to capture an image in continuum and CaK.  A few nice plages are visible in the CaK wavelength. However in 540nm the sun does not show any sunspots. I have not heard yet from Meade on the repair of my Coronado SM40, so this wavelength is still missing in my images.   The solar Activity remains Very Low, but the spotless days continue to count with today being spotless day 247.

This morning low transparency but average seeing.  Solar Activity remains Very Low with no flares in the last two days.  However, I saw a small pore poking up near the W limb, which seemed to grow in size.  I wonder if this will continue.  I believe the faculae in 540nm in the Eastern hemisphere is decaying.  At least it is much harder to make out now where the light intensity is increasing as it continues to rotate to the Meridian.  Two full disk images and close ups of the mentioned areas. I have to correct my post from yesterday, it was Spotless Day 241 instead of 231.  (They don’t repeat )