The Lap: Lunt mixes a proprietary blend of Gugolz pitch for the precision polishing of our Etalon plates via our Continuous Polishing process. The pitch being poured serves as the base for the polishing process. The pitch lap will be scored into a triangular looking pattern using a metal comb by hand. The lap is…
Here is a brief description of the data path from the RED 8k back. Data leaves the DSMCII RED camera through a RED Jetpack SDI that routes the compressed data through a Gigabit Ethernet cable that goes through a 24 port router. Directly from the router into 100tb remote servers at general compression. These will…
Lunt Etalons are precision crafted at our manufacturing facility in Tucson, Arizona. We start with precision cut UV grade Fused Silica blanks that we purchase from a glass supplier in Massachusetts.We use UV grade due to the higher specifications that UV grade material has for reduced bubbles and striae. Both of which would negatively effect…
Instrument: SPEX 1.26M Monochrometer Above is an image of one of our Etalons taken by an independent lab. Specifications: Lunt Solar 50mm Etalon Center Wavelength: 656.28nmPeak Transmission: 79.89%Bandwidth: 0.7 Angstroms (FWHM)FSR: 12.5 Angstroms Our etalons were tested in a blind test along with several etalons from other manufacturers. A) One of the other manufacturers had…
Lunt Solar products are a lot more than the specification that you see when comparing manufacturers. Lunt was started in 2007. Lunt had the advantage of being able to completely re-invent the Solar Telescope from the ground up. We were able to improve on issues that we had seen in previous products and introduce significant…
(continued from part 2) FWHM At the FWHM, or the 42.5%T point: The bandpass is measured in a single system at 0.7A. In DS system the bandpass is the multiplication of the 2 interference filters, 0.7A x 0.7A = 0.49A. To be specific: The new width of the Etalon T curve is moved by a…
(continued from part 1) Uniformity of the etalon plates To continue where I left off in my last post, this widening of the BP from center to edge can be caused uniformity of the etalon plates, over-attenuation of the etalon via excessive tilting, differential heating (i.e., edge heating a solid etalon), or differential pressure to…
It is often stated that once you look through a Double Stacked Solar Telescope, you don’t ever want to go back to Single Stack. However, what is Double Stack and what are the benefits of having a Double Stacked system? There has been significant chatter on Lunt Social Media and e-mail lately regarding Doublestacking, and…
Lunt Solar do not use central obstruction sun filters for telescopes.. Here are a few reasons why. The challenge to early etalon sun filter making was to figure out how to re-produce a ultra high precision flat on a mass production scale. Typically etalon sun filters required a clear aperture for laser and imaging work….
For those who have googled “what’s an etalon?” the returned results outlining complex looking optical equations, mathematical relationships, and technical references probably didn’t do much to answer the question. Unless you are an Optical Physicist of course. (I love that stuff) An etalon refers to an interference type filter typically used in Solar Telescopes because…
Which is Better? The defining difference between an External etalon vs an Internal etalon has typically been Price vs Performance… Well that gap is getting very narrow. External etalons are used on the front of an existing scope, and the user typically asks that the etalon be full aperture. Internal etalons are situated internally to…
The diagram above shows the system has been fully pressurized. This pressure is equivalent to about a 10,000 ft 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…