SUN OF A GUN

 

While sitting on a paint bucket and  meditating on the SUN GUN I saw it!  The SUN OF A GUN. The SUN OF A GUN is a smaller version of the of the SUN GUN utilizing the same construction techniques, and will work with any telescope. It consists of a black plastic 5 gallon black paint bucket , if not black paint the interior flat black. A 2" insert male adapter, adapts polyethylene tubing to standard female pipe thread  ( ACE  Hardware part number 45708 or Lowes Hardware part number 22543),  mounted in a 2 1/4" hole in the center of the bottom of the paint bucket, with two 2" conduit lock nuts (ACE Harware part number 313337 or  Lowes part number 75927).  One lock nut on the inside and the other on the outside of the bucket. Drill a 1/8" hole ½" in on the hose end of the male adapter. The  adapter  will slide over a standard universal camera adapter, using the eyepiece retaining screw, on the camera adapter, to hold the 2"  male adapter and the eyepiece in place. A 15" square Da-Tex rear projection screen (Da-Lite Screen Company 800-622-3737, www.da-lite.com) is mounted to the top of the paint bucket with a 48" wire tie (Home Depot Part number 728494104805), or a large rubber band. Lay the rear projection screen on top of the bucket, polished side facing out. Connect the wire tie so it just fits over the rear projection screen and the top lip of the bucket. Tighten the wire tie under the lip of the bucket and adjust the rear projection screen tight across the top of the bucket, it should look like a drum when done. Cut the excess screen off, leave ½" below the wire tie for future adjustment. Loop a large rubber band through itself on to the handle, hooking  the rubber band over the finder will give it extra support. Use on a telescope with a lens of 4" or less, or stop down a larger  lens to 4" or less.

With the SUN OF A GUN use a 17mm or a 20mm eyepiece, with a # 12 eyepiece filter, on a 4" SCT giving a 11" and a 10" image. If using a telescope with over a  4" lens stop it down to 4" or less. On a 8 SCT, stopped down to 2", a 25mm eyepiece was used. Also a  #21 orange eyepiece filter can be used.  Plossl eyepieces where used because they deliver sharper and better color corrected images than Ramsden or Huygenian eyepieces.”