Here is something worth looking into , if you are planning on spending around 1000.00 on a scope. I have one just like it, minus the 60X .95 and it is in a class, only along with few others. A super precise and ultra stable instrument. In it's day, the relatively small F.N.'s of the compens eyepieces weren't much of a problem but if one really needs more, there are several more recent 10X compens eyepieces I have trialled with those objectives and you can get up to about an F.N. of 18 :so not too bad. This one does not look like it was very heavily used at all. The gold plating on the objectives is in almost mint condition. With that stage on there, it weighs just shy of 30 lbs., and is a surprisingly ergonomic microscope. All the controls are smooth and easy and very close together.
Some of the details in the listing are incorrect but overall, it is pretty close.
https://www.ebay.com/itm/1948-AO-Spence ... SwoYdapL49
Very fine Spencer # 5 for sale on ebay.
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apochronaut
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apochronaut
- Posts: 6327
- Joined: Fri May 15, 2015 12:15 am
Re: Very fine Spencer # 5 for sale on ebay.
It sold pretty fast, gone today, sometime.
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apatientspider
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Re: Very fine Spencer # 5 for sale on ebay.
Well that one didn't last long! Pretty piece and a bit more than all there for a change. i wonder what the original owner wanted the 30x eyepieces for? The price is not a bad one, too - for either buyer and or seller. Well it isn't, if the optics - especially the objectives - are all still in good shape optically.
What I envy (besides that nice box) is that round stage just for its precision and coolness factor, I don't know that I'd ever use it for much instead of a graduated rectangular one. Still, it is what helps to make a research model a complete research model. I presume it's for doing a bit of elementary polarization work in chemical and biological analysis.
The neat thing about Spencer's research models is that they were research models - ie., they were complete stands. Even one as late as these model 5's allowed one to dabble in nearly all aspects of microscopy and investigate all the various techniques that were opening up at the beginning of the last century. And one could do it with the finest grade of optics and precision available at the time.
For example: want to experiment with changing the tube length for correcting cover glass thickness as opposed to being restricted to a certain length with the binocular head? Easy! Just slip off the bino head and set the mono head in place. The mono heads were available in both fixed and adjustable tube length models, whereas the binocular head's tube length (for Spencers) varied a bit depending on how far apart the oculars were adjusted - though even that was set so as to be pretty correct for the average person. Many people think the accessory mono heads were there only for photography, but they made it convenient to use a number of other accessories, such as a camera lucida, projection prisms, eyepiece micrometers, and polarization analyzers.
The one thing I like best about my own number 5 - and to a lesser extent about the number 3 and the model 13 series lab scopes - are the substages. They all have the dovetail yoke or fitting, which racks up and down and carries the various condenser mounts for each model with their iris diaphrams and other accoutrements. One can fit a number of various types of condensers to these yokes, but if one has the adjustable mounting with its centering screws, one can simply rack the entire apparatus down, pull the condenser lens pack out of its mount or carrier and slip something else in. On mine, I can change from the standard achromat/applanat 1.3 to a 1.4 achromat/applanat - or a less expensive 1.4 applanat or wide angle. Conceivably I could even drop a simple two element abbe in there for convenience and simple work (if I had one.) Not only do I have a darkfield lens unit I can use, but also a gizmo to hold an ordinary objective upside down to use as condenser. I can even use condenser lens packs of other makers - usually by just wrapping them with a piece of cardboard or other shim material.
With all these lens packs and elements, I have available both a simple substage or aperture iris and an oblique iris, both of which can stay open or closed as I see fit. Not only that, but if I want to work without a condenser for some reason - say only a concave mirror instead - I do not have to remove the entire substage condenser with it's still very useful diaphrams and filters. I just remove whatever lens packs are in place. Use of a concave mirror for lower power objectives is much neglected these days but can be very convenient; a slide for adjusting the mirror focus up or down and a fully adjustable aperture iris insures excellent results. And no more fiddling around with removing the top element of the condenser, or searching for a suitable swing top, or fitting an auxilliary condenser in there.
I will say this though: on a binocular microscope, without a substage condenser, it is difficult to obtain enough light for anything much more powerful than a 20x to 40x objective lens for even just visual work. All of which means that a decent separate source of illumination is required - preferably a research lamp. There's another fifty to a hundred bucks, but a good one will likely have its own focusable lamp condenser or collector system, and a field iris. It's possible to get good results with a homemade lamp, but either way one has to learn basic principles of illumination - how to use it. That's much too time consuming and/or inconvenient for today's users. Unfortunately they are missing half of what microscopy itself (as opposed to use of a microscope in a particular field of study) has to teach. Sort of like a woodworker who never learns the basics of sharpening a cutting tool.
Anyway, thanks for posting the link, Phil. I wonder what the odds are of this scope actually being used as opposed to sitting in some display cabinet for the next umpteen years?
Jim
What I envy (besides that nice box) is that round stage just for its precision and coolness factor, I don't know that I'd ever use it for much instead of a graduated rectangular one. Still, it is what helps to make a research model a complete research model. I presume it's for doing a bit of elementary polarization work in chemical and biological analysis.
The neat thing about Spencer's research models is that they were research models - ie., they were complete stands. Even one as late as these model 5's allowed one to dabble in nearly all aspects of microscopy and investigate all the various techniques that were opening up at the beginning of the last century. And one could do it with the finest grade of optics and precision available at the time.
For example: want to experiment with changing the tube length for correcting cover glass thickness as opposed to being restricted to a certain length with the binocular head? Easy! Just slip off the bino head and set the mono head in place. The mono heads were available in both fixed and adjustable tube length models, whereas the binocular head's tube length (for Spencers) varied a bit depending on how far apart the oculars were adjusted - though even that was set so as to be pretty correct for the average person. Many people think the accessory mono heads were there only for photography, but they made it convenient to use a number of other accessories, such as a camera lucida, projection prisms, eyepiece micrometers, and polarization analyzers.
The one thing I like best about my own number 5 - and to a lesser extent about the number 3 and the model 13 series lab scopes - are the substages. They all have the dovetail yoke or fitting, which racks up and down and carries the various condenser mounts for each model with their iris diaphrams and other accoutrements. One can fit a number of various types of condensers to these yokes, but if one has the adjustable mounting with its centering screws, one can simply rack the entire apparatus down, pull the condenser lens pack out of its mount or carrier and slip something else in. On mine, I can change from the standard achromat/applanat 1.3 to a 1.4 achromat/applanat - or a less expensive 1.4 applanat or wide angle. Conceivably I could even drop a simple two element abbe in there for convenience and simple work (if I had one.) Not only do I have a darkfield lens unit I can use, but also a gizmo to hold an ordinary objective upside down to use as condenser. I can even use condenser lens packs of other makers - usually by just wrapping them with a piece of cardboard or other shim material.
With all these lens packs and elements, I have available both a simple substage or aperture iris and an oblique iris, both of which can stay open or closed as I see fit. Not only that, but if I want to work without a condenser for some reason - say only a concave mirror instead - I do not have to remove the entire substage condenser with it's still very useful diaphrams and filters. I just remove whatever lens packs are in place. Use of a concave mirror for lower power objectives is much neglected these days but can be very convenient; a slide for adjusting the mirror focus up or down and a fully adjustable aperture iris insures excellent results. And no more fiddling around with removing the top element of the condenser, or searching for a suitable swing top, or fitting an auxilliary condenser in there.
I will say this though: on a binocular microscope, without a substage condenser, it is difficult to obtain enough light for anything much more powerful than a 20x to 40x objective lens for even just visual work. All of which means that a decent separate source of illumination is required - preferably a research lamp. There's another fifty to a hundred bucks, but a good one will likely have its own focusable lamp condenser or collector system, and a field iris. It's possible to get good results with a homemade lamp, but either way one has to learn basic principles of illumination - how to use it. That's much too time consuming and/or inconvenient for today's users. Unfortunately they are missing half of what microscopy itself (as opposed to use of a microscope in a particular field of study) has to teach. Sort of like a woodworker who never learns the basics of sharpening a cutting tool.
Anyway, thanks for posting the link, Phil. I wonder what the odds are of this scope actually being used as opposed to sitting in some display cabinet for the next umpteen years?
Jim
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apochronaut
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Re: Very fine Spencer # 5 for sale on ebay.
Thanks, Jim. A fine microscope at a surprisingly fine price and you've presented an excellent, complete overview of the complex values of a Spencer # 5.
One of the things that doesn't show in an ebay listing, if one isn't familiar with Spencer microscopes, is how different a # 5 is when compared to one of the standard lab microscopes , like the # 33, or even the small research stand # 3, for that matter. The Spencer stands from the early part of the AO era, until sometime after the war, all had similar lines, so they can be confused with one another in pictures as being very similar, with just different stages for instance.
The size of the #5 doesn't show. The case in the pictures of that listing , is 18" tall! Everything about it is robust, yet the proximity of the controls to each other is carefully designed for comfort and to be fatigue free. The fine focus and stage controls, with the higher category stages, both square and rotating, can be actuated with one hand, at the same time.
The stage on that microscope, is the X stage, the absolute best stage they offered. It weighs 4 1/2 lbs., by itself. One piece of information I did not get out of the seller; who was an antique dealer by the way, is whether the grease had hardened in any of the controls. My experience has been that mostly, the Spencer scopes up to the 1950's are quite free of that. In the 1950's, however, it begins to show up a little. If you come across an X model stage, or an instrument with one, you may find a similar situation as the following. The X controls on my instrument , were seized, yet it had completely perfect Y controls. I suspect this would happen on any of them, eventually, due to the length of the X control shafts. There is a very large grease contact surface area on the x control shafts, and hardened grease there will tighten the entire mechanism right up, even though the gears and slides are free. Light oil into the shafts, freed everything up in a couple of days, though.
Nice to see the microscope didn't get parted out but I was kind of hoping it would, in a selfish way. That 60X .95 dry apochromat objective, one I have never encountered before , looked very interesting. I too hope the microscope gets used and doesn't just become a shelf princess.
One of the things that doesn't show in an ebay listing, if one isn't familiar with Spencer microscopes, is how different a # 5 is when compared to one of the standard lab microscopes , like the # 33, or even the small research stand # 3, for that matter. The Spencer stands from the early part of the AO era, until sometime after the war, all had similar lines, so they can be confused with one another in pictures as being very similar, with just different stages for instance.
The size of the #5 doesn't show. The case in the pictures of that listing , is 18" tall! Everything about it is robust, yet the proximity of the controls to each other is carefully designed for comfort and to be fatigue free. The fine focus and stage controls, with the higher category stages, both square and rotating, can be actuated with one hand, at the same time.
The stage on that microscope, is the X stage, the absolute best stage they offered. It weighs 4 1/2 lbs., by itself. One piece of information I did not get out of the seller; who was an antique dealer by the way, is whether the grease had hardened in any of the controls. My experience has been that mostly, the Spencer scopes up to the 1950's are quite free of that. In the 1950's, however, it begins to show up a little. If you come across an X model stage, or an instrument with one, you may find a similar situation as the following. The X controls on my instrument , were seized, yet it had completely perfect Y controls. I suspect this would happen on any of them, eventually, due to the length of the X control shafts. There is a very large grease contact surface area on the x control shafts, and hardened grease there will tighten the entire mechanism right up, even though the gears and slides are free. Light oil into the shafts, freed everything up in a couple of days, though.
Nice to see the microscope didn't get parted out but I was kind of hoping it would, in a selfish way. That 60X .95 dry apochromat objective, one I have never encountered before , looked very interesting. I too hope the microscope gets used and doesn't just become a shelf princess.