Slide Drying Rack

[rnabholz]

I have confessed on this board to being a terrible procrastinator with regard to cleaning my slides after use. After use and a quick rinse, I toss them into a stainless bowl and there they sit until I have the time and gumption to wash them.

That process can be frustrating as well. Cleaning them, and then drying them I found often left them with some lint from the drying cloth or spots from remaining water. I changed my process to make a dip in distilled water the last step, but I still needed get them dry, preferably without touching them.

I thought that maybe a drying rack would do the trick. I could just let them air dry. So I went about putting together something that would suit.

Below you see what I came up with. The only key component is the mini "slinky". They are widely available, and often sold in the mini size as kids party favors for very little money. The "backbone" of my rack is a piece of aluminum C channel. I happened to have it laying around. Almost anything if a similar form would work, wood, plastic, PVC, whatever you have on hand. A material impervious to water is an advantage if you can choose.

The only construction step is to put in two pegs, one at each end on which to "hang" the slinky. I used bolts and nuts, but nails, screws would get the job done.

When done, you simply stretch out the slinky between the pegs, place the entire set up on a towel. Then after the final rinse, simply drop the slide in one of the slots created by the slinky. When it is full, I cover it all with a paper towel, or newspaper until they are dry to keep airborne dust off of them. Because they dry on edge, there are no remaining water spots, and because I did not use a drying towel, there is no lint. Everything is clean as a whistle.

Simple, cheap and effective.

Thought some of you might be interested.

[75RR]

Like the slinky colours!
I use something similar, well, I lean them vertically against a wooden block and let them drip dry after rinsing.
Dust is a problem as you say.

[gekko]

A very creative mind! I would copy your idea if I were industrious enough to use your methods, but I'm not .

[rnabholz]

Like the slinky colours!.

They had red and rainbow, I went for the wild side....

[rnabholz]

A very creative mind! I would copy your idea if I were industrious enough to use your methods, but I'm not .

I suspect unlike me, you are not so slothful as to end up with 50 slides to wash at one time, so any industriousness that you may attribute to me comes in unreliable spurts..... ;^)

[gekko]

A very creative mind! I would copy your idea if I were industrious enough to use your methods, but I'm not .

I suspect unlike me, you are not so slothful as to end up with 50 slides to wash at one time, so any industriousness that you may attribute to me comes in unreliable spurts..... ;^)

Well, I do it the easy way: I use just one slide and cover glass, then rinse it under the tap, wipe it with a microfiber cloth wet with alcohol and dry it, and it will be ready for the next time (either the same session or next time). Of course, if every second counts, then I am wasting some 20 to 30 seconds to clean one set (slide and cover glass), but I am simply far too lazy to want to wash then dry ten or twenty sets, so I would procrastinate for ever (I still have my clocks set to daylight saving time )

[mrsonchus]

Very elegant solution my friend - very nicely made indeed! The colours are a bonus too!

I use a stainless-steel cutlery-rack - the horizontal wire-mesh kind that fits in a drawer, the ribs of the wires are just spaced right to allow slides to be put in (stood-up) at an angle of about 75 degrees - I can get about 30 into each batch this way - and I clean in batches of 24 as that's the size of the container & rack combinations I use for the de-wax and alcohol bath stages of cleaning. Then I wash them all in washing-up liquid and hot water, with a warm-rinse on the way to the rack - the rack with slides I put on my small desk with one of those plastic plant-propagator transparent lids with the sliding vent in the top over the whole thing to keep the dust at bay. Then straight back into a nice clean slide-box for re-use!

[rnabholz]

Very elegant solution my friend - very nicely made indeed! The colours are a bonus too!

I use a stainless-steel cutlery-rack - the horizontal wire-mesh kind that fits in a drawer, the ribs of the wires are just spaced right to allow slides to be put in (stood-up) at an angle of about 75 degrees - I can get about 30 into each batch this way - and I clean in batches of 24 as that's the size of the container & rack combinations I use for the de-wax and alcohol bath stages of cleaning. Then I wash them all in washing-up liquid and hot water, with a warm-rinse on the way to the rack - the rack with slides I put on my small desk with one of those plastic plant-propagator transparent lids with the sliding vent in the top over the whole thing to keep the dust at bay. Then straight back into a nice clean slide-box for re-use!

Sounds like you have a solid system. Glad to hear that someone else lets them pile up a bit....

[mrsonchus]

This is the contraption, works very well,

ws_slides_drying.JPG (108.87 KiB) Viewed 8877 times

I also use it, as in the picture, to drain newly floated-out sections before drying them in the air-drying food dehydrator.

I use these containers for slide-cleaning, 1 for wax-clearing and one for an OH soak if needed, each holds 24 slides and has a really handy rack with handle that lowers the slides into the pot - I get them from China via e-bay and they're about £6 (GB) each - very handy..

staining_jar_pic.JPG (28.99 KiB) Viewed 8877 times

From here...http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/White-Plastic ... 43e28bfbcc


This is the air-drying cabinet I use to dry wax-sections onto slides horizontally, after draining in the rack vertically - this works perfectly,

ws_dehydrator_booklet_cover.jpg (38.4 KiB) Viewed 8876 times

Here it is in action..

ws_dehydrator_front_view.jpg (70.86 KiB) Viewed 8876 times

This beauty can hold about 250 slides - the trays are very useful indeed.

Works perfectly for the task! Amazing how many kitchen/cookery devices are perfect for histology..

[KurtM]

It's always great to see what others do in their home labs, very interesting stuff! I definitely learn more from this kind of post than many others. Thanks, y'all!