Removing dovetail from Heine condenser

[MikeBradley]

I've been trying to remove the Leitz dovetail from my Heine condenser with a camera lens tool, but despite soaking the seam with WD40 it doesn't want to budge. There seems to be the head of a pin visible that could be indicative of a locking pin, though other sources don't mention this. I see that others on this forum use this condenser so perhaps someone could let me know whether they have removed the dovetail, if so how and is

IMG_5371.jpg (160.42 KiB) Viewed 4548 times

there a locking pin?
Thanks
Michael

[PeteM]

Michael -- Pretty sure that pin is meant just as a hard point to register the condenser back and forth. You'll probably find it only threads a short distance in.

Don't have a Heine condenser, but would guess it's just frozen on the threads. Are there a couple of tiny holes for a spanner on top of the chrome retaining ring? If so, I'd aim to get or make a top quality pin spanner that fits, use a better penetrating oil that WD40 (Kroil etc.), carefully heat up the dovetail portion so it expands a bit away from the threads and allows a better soak of the threads.

[viktor j nilsson]

Having done this myself I can confirm that there are two holes on top of the chrome ring. Use a pin spanner and unscrew that, then the rest of the dovetail slides off.

[MikeBradley]

Well I did it! Thanks for the support in telling me it could be done- I persevered. Even if it took clamping the ring in a vice and the strength of my adult son wrenching on the lens tool, not to mention 48hrs of wd40 and heat being applied. Amazingly after all that, the unit sees to work still.

I'm attaching some darkfield images that I took with it of samples from the rare and highly endangered Glass Sponge reef located off parts of the British Columbia coast/Salish Sea. The glass sponge sample had been accidentally brought up (in a fishing net I believe) and I was give a few tiny, broken fragments to look at. They are really beautiful objects. The individual filaments of pure silica that make this particular reef skeleton are between 20-30 microns diameter and exhibit no birefringence. These reefs were once planet wide but are now thought to only exist in these waters of the Salish Sea.

Michael

[PeteM]

Glad it all worked out for you, Mike. Well done.

Just for others' future reference, if you ended up clamping the thin ring or try something like arc-joint pliers -- it will make it close against the threads at the pressure points. This increases the torque needed to remove it.

Good pin spanners are pricey -- but as you probably know are worth having.

If I'm using a vise to hold something like a barrel, I'll also drill a slightly smaller hold in wood and saw that in half to make "soft jaws."