New To Us: Bausch & Lomb V9964

[MortallyWounded]

Hi all! Sorry I have not posted anything since we got the new microscope. Kristen hasn’t used it while I was around and she hasn’t asked me anything. So I haven’t had anything to bring up. But if it weren’t for her interest in biology, my wife never would have looked at this.

https://photos.app.goo.gl/GAYQ4xkTnADi8tQL9

Please let me know what we have here. It came with prepared slides, obviously used in either a medical or teaching environment. There is a light source, a Bakelite “ScopeLite” which, although broken with a loose lens, plugged in and worked. It needs some cleaning for sure, and the immersion oil bottle is kinda sludgy… but we have more. I am too embarrassed to mention the price paid for this thing. But I think it is absolutely gorgeous. And yes, everything works. X-Y stage is super smooth. Course and fine are fabulous. It’s just dirty, that’s all.

Next up for this is a new camera. The camera we got for the AmScope is okay, but not great. This one deserves a great camera.

[apochronaut]

The bad news is that the camera doesn't make the micriscope. The camera can destroy it but not make it. In order for your B& L to be camera ready, an afocal camera photo tube would need to be installed as a subsitute viewiwng body after viewing the object with the optical viewing body. Also, the standard achromatic objectives that a microscope of this vintage would be fitted with would produce only moderately good images compared to planachromats from China. Planarity would be the big issue. B&L apochromats were available in your microscopes era and they would be worthy of some note but their field was a little narrow and a special condenser was/is necessary to get them to their peak.

[BramHuntingNematodes]

That's a fine scope you have there I think made in 1944 what is known as a CBV Dynoptic for medical or laboratory use. The view from the lenses is actually pretty good considering the age of these optics. Plan corrections are not present, sure, so photographs will not look their best. This kind of scope is better for live viewing or projection(nothing beats a monocular for projection) if you like.

If you get some apos you will need to buy a compens eyepiece to go with them. Photos could be taken using the afocal method with a phone camera using a bracket. Might be your best bet as you get the live view as well.

Very nice instrument and in exceptional condition.

I would keep the bottle but not use the immersion oil.

[MortallyWounded]

Whew, that’s a lot of words.

1944 I get. Don’t use the oil, I get (we have fresh oil for the AmScope). Even planar I get. Bottom line, I was pretty sure this is a war-era scope and likely the type my grandmother may have used while studying at Syracuse University. But she was a nurse, so it likely would not have been in her professional repertoire. Regardless, I am a sucker for technical instruments of this vintage.

Now, I know that these sell as low as $100 on eBay, typically without all of the accessories. We paid significantly less than that. Having said that, I don’t believe in letting things like this sit around to look pretty. But since I have little use for it as anything other than a hobbyist, it will likely get some sort of nom-invasive camera. If there is a low-cost (sub $200) option that doesn’t involve hanging a cellphone off the side of it, I’m all for it. Adding some sort of planar correction would be useful.

But I should stop before I get that far. It needs a thorough optic cleaning as one can imagine, so I’ll bring it into work and my Materials Lab manager agreed to help. After that, an original ScopeLite source would be fantastic. Where does one acquire such things when you can’t find them on eBay?

This isn’t meant to be some toy, nor is it an investment. It’s a hobby. My skills end there. I only use scopes for mechanical inspection, not biology. So when it comes to the fancy lighting and polarization etc. that’s where I get lost. Willing to learn but it’s not in my wheelhouse.

If I can get good images of the colon cancer cells that came with it, I’ll share here but the slides are pretty rough.

[MortallyWounded]

Okay, closest thing I can find is the H-series. This would be an HA, Catalog 31-21-54-08 (code word "Agobb") with the achromatic optics; that is, assuming my optics are original. The base looks slightly different, but "All Pictures shown are for illustration purpose only. Actual product may vary due to product enhancement."

https://vademecummicroscope.files.wordp ... pesopt.pdf

Page 4. Price listed at $155 whenever this was published. Now at least I have a source for some parts! Thanks for the help in figuring out the year, I didn't see the letter codes until after they were mentioned.

[BramHuntingNematodes]

No, it's CBV Dynoptic, ever so slightly more recent than the catalog from vade mecum. You can tell by the knobs and the mechanical stage design and the horseshoe shape. Same basic idea though. The objective designs were essentially the same, although coatings may have been introduced around the time of your microscope's manufacture. Condenser is the same size and maybe the entire head assembly is interchangeable.

[apochronaut]

Bram is correct. The H was a lower tier research stand built of cast iron and brass. Very heavy. After the war, both Bausch & Lomb and AO/Spencer started producing newer, lighter wright models and started working aluminum into their stands. Yours is an older high fine focus Dynoptic which was later followed by low coaxial focus stands with more aluminum in them. Eventually the entire frame was aluminum.

[MortallyWounded]

I don’t know… I just found the catalog for Medical Microscopes and it looks more like the BA-8 now. Page 5

Same price as the HA, but with the professional case added. Also included with this lot was a Clay Adams ScopeLite, the round back version.

I still need to see if the condenser is 1.25. And his is a fun thing to get into and I’m learning a bunch about them as I go. I think the wife is just assuming it’s mine now.

[BramHuntingNematodes]

You are following the lineage. Anyway, the nomenclature changed to refer to almost the same microscope, except that later C referred to monocular, T to binocular and TT to triocular.

Edit: I seem to have been looking at the wrong scope in the medical catalog. In 1942, the mechanical stage had chromed knobs whereas it looks like on yours you have the later matte steel. The scopes were in spirit Dynoptics by 1942, but wartime production parts get switched around. They never went back to as much brass as earlier though. B&l is a little unlike Zeiss and AO in that those two had different sized stands that designated the models B&L did a little of that in the thirties but by the time our scopes were being made they were all Dynoptics outfitted with different parts that made for the designations. For instance you got a monocular, ungraduated mechanical stage scope. The original objective load out might have contributed to the full model name in some years depending on what the ad wizards thought was best.

There was basically one more redesign of the Dynoptics that happened in the sixties, only a few parts are interchangeable there.

[BramHuntingNematodes]

Also, I would be very surprised if that condenser was anything but an1.25 abbe. The top unscrews for a lower na. Paraboloid darkfield condensers are pretty common for this scope. It's a good upgrade and usually p. cheap

[MortallyWounded]

Well, thank you for all of your assistance. I have a pretty good idea now what I have, maybe not exactly but like everything else there are so many variants that there was no way to find them all, unless someone went to the dealer and said "I want that exact thing just like in the photo, no exceptions." Goes for cars, pocketwatches, and evidently microscopes.

We don't want to do too much to this to modify it. Finding a camera rig that will capture specimens and an era-correct, unbroken light source are my main objectives (no pun intended). I don't plan on changing anything out. But I may talk to the guys in our plating department about possibly refinishing the tube, as it does have some blistering. It may not be worth it to do all that though. I love it the way it is, and if it works then great.

Again, my interests are more mechanical and historical, so for biology the kid has a descent student-grade AmScope. If I were to invest in a microscope for daily use, it would be for watch repair or photography (daguerreotype, glass negatives, etc.) and these biological, high-power scopes are not much use to me. They are fascinating though, and the era this one came from is of significant importance to me since I have so many relatives (past and present) in the medical field, as well as teachers and historians.