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Help on cleaning prepared slides
Posted: Tue Jun 12, 2018 3:50 pm
by arthur.tarso
Hi folks,
I purchased a box of prepared slides to analyse and the slides came with a lot of dust on top of it, which is disturbing the image quite a lot. I'm afraid of accidentally removing the cover slips while cleaning it.
How do you suggest I clean this slides?
I`m attaching some pictures so you can see their state
Re: Help on cleaning prepared slides
Posted: Tue Jun 12, 2018 4:08 pm
by MicroBob
They will be suitable to be watched with an oil immersion objective. The oil is usually cleaned away with what we call in german "Waschbenzin". So they will probably withstand this fluid.
A first try would be just breathing on it and wipe them with the condensation and tissue.
Re: Help on cleaning prepared slides
Posted: Tue Jun 12, 2018 4:14 pm
by JGardner
I bought two sets of prepared slides recently and they had lots of dust and fingerprints all over them. I cleaned then with isopropyl alcohol (IPA) 91% and didn't have any issues with the cover slips coming off.
Re: Help on cleaning prepared slides
Posted: Tue Jun 12, 2018 4:22 pm
by arthur.tarso
JGardner wrote:I bought two sets of prepared slides recently and they had lots of dust and fingerprints all over them. I cleaned then with isopropyl alcohol (IPA) 91% and didn't have any issues with the cover slips coming off.
Did you rub it with tissue or just pressed the tissue over it to remove the dust?
Re: Help on cleaning prepared slides
Posted: Tue Jun 12, 2018 7:45 pm
by mrsonchus
The best method I've found is simply to wash them with warm soapy water - avoiding label/s of course, and rinse well with plain water (warm water dries more quickly and is able to be 'finished off' with a soft cloth more easily also).
I've cleaned hundreds of slides this way with the occasional loss of cover-slip from a freshly-made slide that I attempted to spruce-up a little too soon after mounting...
I've never had a fully-hardened permanently-mounted slide lose a cover-slip this way.
Before viewing I always use a 'rocket-puffer' on both sides of the slide a couple of times to ensure no fine dust lingers.
John B.
Re: Help on cleaning prepared slides
Posted: Wed Jun 13, 2018 2:04 am
by JGardner
arthur.tarso wrote:JGardner wrote:I bought two sets of prepared slides recently and they had lots of dust and fingerprints all over them. I cleaned then with isopropyl alcohol (IPA) 91% and didn't have any issues with the cover slips coming off.
Did you rub it with tissue or just pressed the tissue over it to remove the dust?
Gentle rubbing with a soft cotton cloth.