Can a regular telescope, fitted with the required accessories, be less expensive than a solar telescope?
It depends on the wavelength in which you want to specialize. Ionized calcium, (the purple looking photos) can be added to small refractors for about $200. This filter comes as a set that must be aligned and mounted to achieve maximum contrast. Notes are included on building a solar-scope with tilt tuned interference filters. http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?Vie… The way the above filter works is there are multiple layers of transparent material built up on the glass filters. By tilting these filters to the incident beam of sunlight, you force the light to go thru thicker or thinner layers (depending on the angle of the tilt) by precisely tuning two such filters, you can effectively and cheaply remove all other wavelengths from the mix. Hydrogen alpha wavelength is just more expensive BUT, you don’t have to “roll your own.” It comes complete and ready to use. The PST is actually very reason
