MicrobeHunter.com Microscopy Forum

That's my understanding.

Measuring field width via a micrometer slide should determine whether it applies to your particular eyepiece?

PeteM wrote: ↑

Thu Mar 21, 2024 5:22 pm

I believe the old photo/film anti-static brushes had a "lightly" radioactive element incorporated with the hairs to produce ions. Not sure if they're still available today.

Wow I had no idea! Just need to find someone with a geiger counter now...

My drum scanner came with a large brush labelled as anti-static. I'll look up the make when I get home.

It appears to be made of animal hair. It does seem to work, but the drums are acrylic so no guarantee it'll work on glass.

Condensation possibly. I don't think it was. I had a good look at the objective and couldn't see any, however there was a patch with the characteristic oily interference colours. There is a good chance to repair de-lamination if you are able to disassemble the item. Yes, I've had a lot of success w...

10, maybe 15 max.

Just had an interesting delamination experience. I bought a 10x Zeiss Planapo as an upgrade to my 10x Neofluar. The box was on my step when I got home from work on Friday. I unpacked it and attached it to my Universal. Immediately I saw a problem - I couldn't get a sharp image. The overall image was...

Problem with the dyes is the terrible mess if the dye solution (or powder) is accidentally spilled Thanks for the warning! Also note, that fluorescence brightness benefits from high NA, since the amount of light gathered by the objective strongly grows with the NA. Yes, I was aware of this and took...

Thanks again for the advice. Actually had some success last night after going through my box of prepared slides - a couple of stem sections showed a fairly strong result in Position 4. The top one is a sunflower stem. There's no info on stains used. AL-7159.jpg AL-7162.jpg The illumination reaching ...

Thanks both, useful info. There are no markings on the filter rims. Here are some pictures with afternoon sunshine as the illuminator: Exciters, hopefully showing both reflection and transmission: IMG_6082.jpg Slot I is empty, slot 2 is dye filters only so only 3 and 4 the reflections from the inter...

Thanks. The III RS doesn't have cubes, it has two sliders. One holds the exciter filters, these are push fit and can be easily changed, the other slider has the mirrors and emission filters held more securely. So in use it's possible to experiment by swapping the exciter set with the mirror/barrier ...

Yes. Fluorescence in general is dimmer by orders of magnitude than the excitation light. Often, fluorescence microscopy is done in a half-darkened room. Hmm. had a 'look' at some moss last night. With my 30W halogen lamp at full power (same luminance as the more common finned tube 60w lamphouse), i...

The commonest and easiest fluorophore is chlorophyll, either in green plants or in briophytes or algae. I would suggest the latter. Moss "leaves" are excellent. The best excitation is violet light of wavelength 405-425nm, NOT UV. A peace of moss in water will fluoresce red. Thanks, I'll give that a...

I recently picked up a box of Zeiss bits which included a Zeiss III RS head which I've been playing around with on my Universal III. The filters are mostly in good condition thankfully. One beam splitter has a bubbly look but still gives a viewable image. A few of the dye filters had hazy surfaces w...

. . . Eyepieces and telan lenses are a different matter, at least half are seriously delaminated, but thankfully repair is easier. . . Adam - - curious -- have you found a way to repair delamination in the intermediate pieces (finite adjusting telan lenses)? I've heard of some folks soaking them in...

I accumulated four Zeiss standards before making room for a Universal. It has a big footprint but is now truly worthy of the name with all the lighting options I want plus easy switching between, as well an Optovar and Trino head built-in. Stage and condenser are easily adjusted or removed as requir...

1) I must have about 30 Zeiss objectives now. Only two show any delamination, only one of which, 16x PH2 Neofluar, seriously degrades the image (fine detail is doubled). The other, Planapo 25x, shows multiple planes of delamination but limited to the periphery so still gives good images. Eyepieces a...

I have a Zeiss LD-Epiplan 40x/0.60 which might worth a look. They are not common on the used market but not sought after; mine was £50.

I will have to check the working distance but from memory it is a few mm.

I have the Zeiss 2.5x (modern version), the 6.3x Neofluar and the 4x Planapo (older version). The 6.3x NF has by far the most working distance, and unlike the 2.5x the objective is tapered which gives even more room. The older 2.5x looks a little narrower than mine, but not as much as the 6.3x. I wo...

Thanks Tim, very useful. I got an old Zeiss DIC set in the autumn and am very happy with it. With tweaking I've found it gives good results with most of my objectives although backgrounds are typically uneven. My favourite combinations are the 16x Neofluar with Prism I and the 63x Neofluar 1.25 oil ...

I fine lens indeed, what sort of trans DIC combination have you come up with? Just this week I received a condenser and slider of the first generation. The parts are a little beaten up but the results are great so far, despite not using the correct objectives. Previously I did play around a little ...

Fantastic images Wes!

The Planapo 25/0.65 is also one of my favourite objectives. It seems to play nicely with the first generation of Zeiss DIC too, though it is early days for me with trans DIC.

Hi Adam, Thank you for your comment. The diatom measures at 40x60 µm. I used DIC with a 40/0,95 apochromat Zeiss Jena objective, the microscope was setup for afocal projection with a 10/18 Kpl-W eyepiece (with a 40 mm pancake lens on a Canon 50D). The diatom was attached to the underside of the cov...

Great results Wes.

I've recently been experimenting with pushing the resolution limits of my Zeiss Universal on similar subjects, so any technical details would be appreciated. And how big is this diatom?

Me too. I'm in the UK.

You can, but you need epi-illumination which means the light comes from the top through the same objective used for viewing. Yes, the focal plane and working distances become very limited, but in my experience it can be more user friendly at higher mags than working with water-on-slide mounts and tr...

The only good resource I've found is here: https://www-funsci-it.translate.goog/schede-tecniche.html?_x_tr_sl=it&_x_tr_tl=en&_x_tr_hl=en-US&_x_tr_pto=wapp I can't see any Zeiss infinity optics unfortunately. There was also this recent thread: https://www.microbehunter.com/microscopy-forum/viewtopic....

To be honest this can be a problem even with dedicated epi heads (I have a Zeiss Universal). Crossed polarisers are the solution, albeit with the loss of much light, but closing down the field diaphragm to exactly match or slightly vignette also helps a lot. So I'd suggest looking at ways to collima...

I hadn't realised I had a slide full of amoeba until I happened to be playing about with crossed polarisers. Even at low power the amoebas jump out at you, glittering brightly as the crystals in the cytoplasm flow around the cell. I now use this method routinely to check for amoeba, I recommend you ...

I have a couple of drum scanners which I use to scan large format film. Much like my Zeiss Universal, these were $50,000 items I picked up on ebay for a couple of hundred. It is an interesting combination of mainly analogue components giving a digital result. The chassis/ arrangement is not dissimil...

I have at least 4 in my Zeiss assortment.

25x /0.45 Plan Ph2
25x /0.65 Planapo 40x F 63x /1.25 Neofluar oil The last is the most obviously concave to the eye, and not the most user friendly design when it comes to applying and removing oil.