MicrobeHunter.com Microscopy Forum

That was new to me - thanks. A sort of animated Rorschach test.

No wonder we're sometimes inclined to anthropomorphize protist antics.

Our high school biology teacher, some 60 or so years ago, said that the key thing about living things is that they respond to their environment. I blurted out . . . that would make rocks living things since when pushed, they roll downhill. Good news -- your slide is buzzing with energy and life, lik...

Reflected light DIC uses one prism above the objective. That prism shears the light reflected down to illuminate the specimen and then combines it headed back up into the eyepieces. As you likely know, there's no need for a condenser with prisms. In the case of Nikon and Olympus (and likely Reichert...

I've had good luck with them, especially the ones with a diopter adjustment. In some stereo scopes (Leica CMO, Olympus SZH-U, etc.)they need to sit lower in the tube to be parfocal. The price is right, even if you later decide to go for OEM eyepieces. My own SZ-4045 has Olympus 10x/23 eyepieces. I m...

That's it. A bit of grease can help hold them in place for reassembly.

Crossed. Do you also have a spacer to separate groups crossed rollers?

I'd consider this an opportunity to get a 40x Olympus DPlan objective. 40x is one of the most challenging magnifications (compared to 10x and 20x), and the DPlan is a significantly better, but still affordable, objective. As Phil said, this may have oil intrusion. Olympus' educational achromat obje...

I'd consider this an opportunity to get a 40x Olympus DPlan objective. 40x is one of the most challenging magnifications (compared to 10x and 20x), and the DPlan is a significantly better, but still affordable, objective. As Phil said, this may have oil intrusion. Olympus' educational achromat objec...

They are usually "standing" and crisscrossed to provide lateral stability while still rolling.

It will fit, but may not be optically compatible.

If dtrinh's DM750 uses HC optics and the eBay head is from an older Delta system DMR, the corrections will be off. In addition, some of the DMR series had the tube lens at the top of the stand and (most) others in the head.

As far as I know, the Leica "DM" microscopes all use the same dovetail. However, there are some older heads with "Delta" optics and more recent ones with "HC" optics that use different corrections. If yours is an HC system, you want an HC head and eyepieces (and vice versa) and add only HC or HCX ob...

Ben, I just to a look at your YouTube channel.

Wow! This should be a lot of fun (from protists to volcanos) for our "Micronauts.

Thanks for putting the work into all those video clips.

I agree - these can offer good value for the price.

One partial fix for the B&L gaskets is to use a couple of arch punches (OD and ID) and thin foam or rubber gasket material. Even an scrapped tire tube might work for the material. Having ventured inside some of the older stereo microscope clones, no matter how closely they resemble the real thing (O...

Stephen, do you have any idea of the mechanical build quality of these scopes? I've seen older Chinese zoom scopes with similar side handle zoom operation (Scienscope, Omax, AmScope, etc.) end up sloppy (poor bearing surfaces, cracked plastic housings, loss of parfocality) after a few year's use, an...

If you don't want to do everything on a screen or pay a high price for a Leica trinocular, another approach is to get an intermediate teaching piece. These are sometimes fairly inexpensive. I've seen several Reichert Microstar teaching heads under $100. Leica DM ones are harder to find. With a teach...

The Olympus BH and BX dovetails are around 47mm at the bottom, with a 60 degree angle to the top. Someone with a lathe, even a wood lathe, might be able to turn down the AO/Reichert condenser dovetail ring to fit?

Oh, well. Good thing is that your Zeiss condenser should be even more popular in Europe. Someone will have a good swap for you.

A better-corrected condenser should help the color fringing you're seeing. As Phil suggests, the Olympus .90 swing-away condenser would be a good choice. The lack of contrast may be partly an issue of the objectives if they scatter light excessively. Are they Olympus Plan or UPlanFl and in good shape?

To add detail - the two adapters shown were machined out of aluminum. Of the four metric threads, the 58mm was scavenged from a camera filter adapter and epoxied in a pocket. That approach should work with 3D-printed parts as well. Three threads were approximated on an inch-thread lathe and cut a bi...

I'd be happy to swap something of similar value for it that you can use, assuming you're in the US (cheap postage). We do a kids' "Micronaut" program and it could upgrade one of our scopes.

In what should have been evident to me a few years back (but wasn't), it's often possible to re-purpose other brands of stereo microscope objectives to the CMO scope of your choosing. Stephen was the one who alerted me to this. It's easy enough to roughly test compatibility by hand-holding the objec...

FWIW, probably best to look at "sold" listings to get an idea of offers to fellow enthusiasts.

Patience is a virtue, but I doubt you'll find anything less expensive than the couple of better-quality BX40's that have come and gone or the BH2 offered earlier for $2K plus shipping.

Don, I'm planning to nominate you as chief marketing officer for protists. Your titles - and then your poetic descriptions - always bring a smile.

Congratulations on getting it running. Mechanical systems submit fairly readily to discovery and tinkering. No so with microscopes missing their software and its documentation.

The shallow end of the "pond" likely has an ideal combination of abundant nutrients and shallow depth for sun to penetrate? Also looks like animal tracks at that end - perhaps some critter introduced some additional critters to the food chain? A third possibility is that as the pond dries, protists ...

Thanks, Jochen.

Jochen - thank you for posting your very clever flash adaptations. One question - it looks like the wire in your original (flash tube put in older cylindrical Zeiss lamp housing) has the normal insulation and connectors - perhaps rated for 300 to 600 volts? Have you found any problems with leakage o...

With respect to stage controls - the early Nikons and several other models had sliding stages that could be either OEM or adapted to your inverted microscope. The old black Nikon version is very good. These work wonderfully for chasing protists while, say, making a video. The movements are viscously...