Hi all - it arrived this morning!
It doesn't work!
No fault with the objective, which is truly immaculate with a totally smooth iris - in lovely crystal-clear condition in fact.
But, as suspected the field of the objective is so large that the circle of light from the condenser or without condenser the field iris on the Orthoplan's light port cannot come close to filling the field. The result is a (very) vignetted field of view....
Tried with top condenser lens swung out - no good, with condenser removed - no good, with condenser top-lens swung in (you never know) - no good. I couldn't get the Orthoplan's stage to lower enough to focus with it either - I had to put the slide across the (empty) condenser-holder's arms and use this as an 'extra low-down' stage if you like, to enable focus.
I tried it in my SM-LUX which just about had the travel to focus the slide - 3cm below the lowest point of the objective is where it focused. Still, this seems just a combination of the maximum travel of the Orthoplan needing to be lowered a little, and the fact that this objective is quite long for a low power objective, by virtue of it's built-in iris mechanism. It is for example considerably longer than the x4 objective which has no iris assembly on-board.
Tried just about every combination of 'scope and condenser etc but no joy. Knowing how superb the Leitz 'scopes are it seems clear that the answer would be the fabled 'large-field condenser' which I suspect will be very hard to find indeed.
So, I've contacted the fellow from whom I bough it to see how he feels about a return - having made it perfectly clear that the objective is faultless - in fact it's immaculate. So, I'll wait to see what happens and put it down to experience!
I don't suppose anyone knows where I can buy a wide-field condenser for the Orthoplan?
I have a thought that a simple 'bull'seye' lens swung in below the condenser ala the Abbe condensers may do the trick though. If I end-up keeping it I'll see what I can do while I wait and search forlornly for a wide field condenser....
Thanks for all the input chaps!
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