My long awaited DMK21AUG618 webcam arrived on Friday. This probably explains why most of the weekend there was either total or partial cloud cover. Got all the drivers and software loaded on the pooter, plugged it all in and Bingo – everything works. The USB 2 hub on the pier didn’t like it when I tried to run the camera off it – saying there wasn’t enough power- but just plugging in the power lead to it got everything working. I do have a 12v – 5v power converter module, so really need to connect this all up, as I suspect plugging more USB devices in will cause failure to connect.
By Sunday afternoon the low cloud started to clear, but there were persistent sheets of the really high thin stuff. We decided to open up anyway on the chance that a few gaps might appear in the huff.  There’s a lot of Solar activity at the moment with groups 1482, 1484 and 1486 plus numerous other smaller ones. I ran about 6 imaging runs using a mix of 1000 and 2000 frame sequences. The high cloud never went, but one sequence was made with no appreciable cloud movement, so this is the one processed above.
Of the 2000 frames I only ended up with about 300. While detail is very soft, you can make out the threading in the plages and granularity around them. One thing that is noticeable is the softening of focus around the outer 1/3rd of the image. The only explanation I can suggest for this is that I didn’t choose any alignment points at the edges while processing, so perhaps Registax doesn’t alignment these areas!
The forecast for tomorrow is looking better, so will try again then.