The partial eclipse began at about 10am and was only about 12%. I took a look at it using a portable tripod, Canon 450D camera, iOptron SkyTracker, an expensive 100m SkyWatcher achromatic refractor and a home made sun filter using Baader solar film. To assemble this arrangement, the ball joint head of the tripod is unscrewed and the exposed threaded bolt screwed directly into the base of the SkyTracker. The tripod ball joint head is then screwed into the RA driven plate of the SkyTracker. In order to mount the telescope onto the plate attached to the top of the ball joint – that would normally hold the camera – I had to find a nut and bolt small enough to go through the plate and screw that to the mounting bar on the underside of the telescope. A cable release completes the set-up to allow adhoc pictures to be taken.
Here’s one of the images showing a few sunspots
