Hello from Serbia

What is your microscopy history? What are your interests? What equipment do you use?
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GrbovicMicroscopy
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Hello from Serbia

#1 Post by GrbovicMicroscopy » Thu Jul 18, 2019 7:32 am

My name is Petar Grbovic
Love the vintage monocular microscopes and use them strictly.

I am a student of food technology and work in a biochemical lab as a technician.
My microscopes are a PZO Poland(bought second hand 100€) microscope and a Reichert Austria (bought second hand 40€)
Interesting thing is that the Reichert microscope has no rust and no deterioration while being a lot older then the PZO microscope which has some rust on the mechanical stage.

My passion is slide making and finding organisms in pond water and other samples. But most of all slide making of plant specimens.

Visit my instagram Account
https://instagram.com/grbovicmicroscopy ... wyo1yjh0z8

Here is one of my latest specimens: Stem of the blueberry
Lat: Rubus fruticosus agg.
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75RR
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Re: Hello from Serbia

#2 Post by 75RR » Thu Jul 18, 2019 8:04 am

Hi GrbovicMicroscopy, welcome

Nice to see those "classic" microscopes being used.

Do you know their approximate year of manufacture?
Zeiss Standard WL (somewhat fashion challenged) & Wild M8
Olympus E-P2 (Micro Four Thirds Camera)

Hobbyst46
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Re: Hello from Serbia

#3 Post by Hobbyst46 » Thu Jul 18, 2019 8:36 am

Welcome.
True "rust" is iron oxides and carbonate, formed by corrosion of iron-containing metal surfaces. If found on the stage, I would suspect that the scope has been exposed to solutions of common salt (NaCl) or other chlorides. Superficial rust can be removed by covering with dilute phosphoric acid, sometimes even with citric acid. It can take a couple of hours for complete cleanliness.

MicroBob
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Re: Hello from Serbia

#4 Post by MicroBob » Thu Jul 18, 2019 4:29 pm

Hi Petar,
welcome to the forum!
When you can get along withou a binocular tube you gain a much wider range of nice microscopes to choos from, liky your two. The straight tube of a horse shoe microscope degrades the image in fact less than an inclined or trinocular tube does.

Would you like to tell a bit more about your slide making? How do you make the sections, do you embed, staining and mounting?

Bob

GrbovicMicroscopy
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Re: Hello from Serbia

#5 Post by GrbovicMicroscopy » Thu Jul 18, 2019 4:54 pm

75RR wrote:Hi GrbovicMicroscopy, welcome

Nice to see those "classic" microscopes being used.

Do you know their approximate year of manufacture?

The PZO microscope i really do not know the year, as for the Reichert i found one picture online that said that my microscope is the 1946 model... But i suspect the source may not be reliable. There is really not much information on these microscopes. The Reichert was stored in an attic and some guy found it and sold it to me, its objectives were covered in canada balsam and some immersion oil on the 100x. So i guess it was used a lot.. Would love to know where it was before it got to me.

GrbovicMicroscopy
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Re: Hello from Serbia

#6 Post by GrbovicMicroscopy » Thu Jul 18, 2019 5:02 pm

Hobbyst46 wrote:Welcome.
True "rust" is iron oxides and carbonate, formed by corrosion of iron-containing metal surfaces. If found on the stage, I would suspect that the scope has been exposed to solutions of common salt (NaCl) or other chlorides. Superficial rust can be removed by covering with dilute phosphoric acid, sometimes even with citric acid. It can take a couple of hours for complete cleanliness.

This microscope is made of steal at least a lot pf parts are made of steal. That leads me to believe that it is of recent manufacture. I may be wrong. Thank you for the tip i will try it when i get a hold of some acid.

GrbovicMicroscopy
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Re: Hello from Serbia

#7 Post by GrbovicMicroscopy » Thu Jul 18, 2019 5:37 pm

MicroBob wrote:Hi Petar,
welcome to the forum!
When you can get along withou a binocular tube you gain a much wider range of nice microscopes to choos from, liky your two. The straight tube of a horse shoe microscope degrades the image in fact less than an inclined or trinocular tube does.

Would you like to tell a bit more about your slide making? How do you make the sections, do you embed, staining and mounting?

Bob
The sections are made by hand (plants) while tissue slides of course require microtomes, i plan on buying a hand microtome at a later date so i will be abled to make slides of fish tissue and so on. The mounting mediums i use are Entellan and Canada balsam. These need Xylol so that they dissolve into the specimen. But the specimen has to be soaked in Xylol and before xylol into baths of alchohol so it would be dehidrated. If canada balsam are mixed with specimens directly from alchohole bubbles are formed. The same is for water. The thing is that these two (water and alchohole) are not compatible with canada balsam. The procidure is a bit complicated by staining. Becouse some stains are desovable in water (astra blue) and alchohole (safranin) which i kostly use for stining plants.

If you have any questions ask me.
You can check my instagram account i post there regularly and will post some procceses as i find some tripod for my iphone.
Best regards thank you all for the warm welcome

Petar (Piter in english)

MicroBob
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Re: Hello from Serbia

#8 Post by MicroBob » Thu Jul 18, 2019 6:58 pm

Here in Germany Euparal is the preferred mounting medium for plant sections. It is tolerant to slight amounts of water, gives beautiful and long lasting slides and is easy to use.
Our colleagues in Bonn do very impressive plant sectioning, always aimed at the amateur with his limited means: http://www.mikroskopie-bonn.de/themenga ... index.html

I myself like to make permanent slides too: Diatoms, Radiolaria, plant sections. For plant sectioning I use a hand microtome, bed the plant stem in a carrot and cut with a 3D printed blade holder: https://www.mikroskopie-forum.de/index. ... #msg245118

Google translator will help you with the german text.

Bob

GrbovicMicroscopy
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Re: Hello from Serbia

#9 Post by GrbovicMicroscopy » Fri Jul 19, 2019 4:47 am

MicroBob wrote:Here in Germany Euparal is the preferred mounting medium for plant sections. It is tolerant to slight amounts of water, gives beautiful and long lasting slides and is easy to use.
Our colleagues in Bonn do very impressive plant sectioning, always aimed at the amateur with his limited means: http://www.mikroskopie-bonn.de/themenga ... index.html

I myself like to make permanent slides too: Diatoms, Radiolaria, plant sections. For plant sectioning I use a hand microtome, bed the plant stem in a carrot and cut with a 3D printed blade holder: https://www.mikroskopie-forum.de/index. ... #msg245118

Google translator will help you with the german text.

Bob
Thank you! Their pictures of plants are amazing i will try to translate it and read all of it.
I was thinking of trying to embed plants in parafin that was molded to fit in the hand microtome.

As for Euparal i will try to order it online.

If you could explain how do you make diatom and radiolaria slides i would be gratefull.

MicroBob
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Re: Hello from Serbia

#10 Post by MicroBob » Fri Jul 19, 2019 7:58 am

Hi Petar,

Radiolaria mounting in LOCA: http://www.mikrohamburg.de/Programm/Pro ... 181117.pdf
Diatom cleaning and mounting: http://www.mikrohamburg.de/Programm/Pro ... 170917.pdf
Diatom arranging: http://www.mikrohamburg.de/Programm/Pro ... 170218.pdf

Plant sectioning in detail (by Klaus, our plancton expert!): http://www.mikrohamburg.de/Programm/Pro ... 190119.pdf

Of cause there are a lot of different other methods. Hobbyst46 and I have written about some experiments about Diatom cleaning with household methods in this form a while ago.

Bob

GrbovicMicroscopy
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Re: Hello from Serbia

#11 Post by GrbovicMicroscopy » Fri Jul 19, 2019 8:36 am

MicroBob wrote:Hi Petar,

Radiolaria mounting in LOCA: http://www.mikrohamburg.de/Programm/Pro ... 181117.pdf
Diatom cleaning and mounting: http://www.mikrohamburg.de/Programm/Pro ... 170917.pdf
Diatom arranging: http://www.mikrohamburg.de/Programm/Pro ... 170218.pdf

Plant sectioning in detail (by Klaus, our plancton expert!): http://www.mikrohamburg.de/Programm/Pro ... 190119.pdf

Of cause there are a lot of different other methods. Hobbyst46 and I have written about some experiments about Diatom cleaning with household methods in this form a while ago.

Bob
Thank you very much Bob! Cant wait to find some time and try everything!

Yesterday i have browsed this forum for some time and i love it, so much good information, especialy from you and Hobbyst46, i have to read a bit more today. I will post results and my slides soon at another topic of course.

Can i ask how long have you been interested in this hobby?

Hobbyst46
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Re: Hello from Serbia

#12 Post by Hobbyst46 » Fri Jul 19, 2019 10:21 am

@GrbovicMicroscopy

About diatom cleaning and mounting, there are truely instructive and real-life exemplary posts by rnabholz (with contributions from others)-
viewtopic.php?f=10&t=3036&p=58300&hilit=pleurax#p58300
and by Charles (whose knowledgable and helpful comments on the forum I miss for a long time), cleaning, arranging and mounting
viewtopic.php?f=10&t=4227&p=39005&hilit=pleurax#p39005
in addition to numerous protocols in the general literature. Some of which rely on dangerous chemicals that should only be used in a professional-level lab. BTW, xylene is something I would avoid using at home.

MicroBob
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Re: Hello from Serbia

#13 Post by MicroBob » Fri Jul 19, 2019 1:30 pm

GrbovicMicroscopy wrote:Can i ask how long have you been interested in this hobby?
from teen age on but I soon got stuck as I didn't have access to information and materials.
Then in the early 2000s I found the german microscopy forum and the "Mikrofibel", a very good compilation of information on microscopes and micro technique. I bought a better microscope, a monocular Will course microscope from the 1980s. But next to family and job and as I was just restoring and enlarging an old house I didn't get much done until 2012 when I came to the MIKRO Hamburg. My activities started to increase, especially since I'm more involved with the organisation of our group. The linked documents were all reports form group meetings, the first tree prepared by me. It is always very motivating to get things started, when there is a fixed deadling coming closer! :lol:

There was a thread a while ago about the very interesting IOR microscopes from Romania, not too for from you.

Bob

GrbovicMicroscopy
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Re: Hello from Serbia

#14 Post by GrbovicMicroscopy » Sat Jul 20, 2019 9:51 am

MicroBob wrote:
GrbovicMicroscopy wrote:Can i ask how long have you been interested in this hobby?
from teen age on but I soon got stuck as I didn't have access to information and materials.
Then in the early 2000s I found the german microscopy forum and the "Mikrofibel", a very good compilation of information on microscopes and micro technique. I bought a better microscope, a monocular Will course microscope from the 1980s. But next to family and job and as I was just restoring and enlarging an old house I didn't get much done until 2012 when I came to the MIKRO Hamburg. My activities started to increase, especially since I'm more involved with the organisation of our group. The linked documents were all reports form group meetings, the first tree prepared by me. It is always very motivating to get things started, when there is a fixed deadling coming closer! :lol:

There was a thread a while ago about the very interesting IOR microscopes from Romania, not too for from you.

Bob

When i was a kid i wanted to have a microscope but never had. When i got the job (at 20 years of age) in the lab my first thing to buy was a microscope that was about 2 years ago. But the real interest came from my faculty where i used a monocular microscope regularly. I was hooked to them and the binoculars at my work looked ugly :lol:
I know i will have to put this hobby on the side some day but for now i love it and wont stop. Would love to organise group meetings here in Serbia but there are few and far between here that like this hobby. I hope to learn a lot from this forum. Cant thank you all enough for the warm welcome!

GrbovicMicroscopy
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Re: Hello from Serbia

#15 Post by GrbovicMicroscopy » Sat Jul 20, 2019 9:55 am

Hobbyst46 wrote:@GrbovicMicroscopy

About diatom cleaning and mounting, there are truely instructive and real-life exemplary posts by rnabholz (with contributions from others)-
viewtopic.php?f=10&t=3036&p=58300&hilit=pleurax#p58300
and by Charles (whose knowledgable and helpful comments on the forum I miss for a long time), cleaning, arranging and mounting
viewtopic.php?f=10&t=4227&p=39005&hilit=pleurax#p39005
in addition to numerous protocols in the general literature. Some of which rely on dangerous chemicals that should only be used in a professional-level lab. BTW, xylene is something I would avoid using at home.
Unfortunatly the use of xylene is necissary for me becouse of the use of Canada balsam.. for now i do not have any other permanent mounting medium, i will try to find Euperal as soon as i am abled.. But for now im stuck.. Thank you

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Roldorf
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Re: Hello from Serbia

#16 Post by Roldorf » Sat Jul 20, 2019 10:38 am

You can get it in very small amounts over the internet from here:- https://www.omikron-online.de/index.php ... -10&lang=1
Location: Northern Germany

Unknown Brand: Optika SFX 91: Bresser Science Infinity: Canon 4000d
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MicroBob
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Re: Hello from Serbia

#17 Post by MicroBob » Sat Jul 20, 2019 3:33 pm

GrbovicMicroscopy wrote:Unfortunatly the use of xylene is necissary for me becouse of the use of Canada balsam
Canada Balsam is still a useful mounting medium, but I like the Euparal process better for plant sections out of carrot embedding.
When you embed in paraffine it probably doesn't make a difference since you use xylene anyway. Xylene is the main ingredient of nitro thinner which is sold to everybody for DIY purposes. It is comparatively harmful if treated unsafe. Much more so than e.g. white spirit or turpentine substitute. For me personally it is within the range of substances I keep and use if I can't avoid it, but I use it sparingly and take safety precautions. Using it outside and strictly avoiding skin contact will help a lot. But this is a decision everybody has to make for himself and it depends also a lot on the "home lab" conditions one has available.

Bob

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