[Leica] Delicate Operation
Aram Langhans
leica_r8 at hotmail.com
Sat May 22 19:44:33 PDT 2021
I have been looking for a decent microscope ever since I retired 13
years ago. A biologist w/o a microscope is like a photographer w/o a
camera. I have owned or had access to a microscope ever since 4th grade
when I used my Christmas money to buy a Tasco. When in California I
happened to look at Craig's List and found someone with a nice Nikon
scope advertised "Like New" and two AO scopes missing some lenses he was
tossing in all for $100. It took a few weeks to hook up, but we met in
a WalMart parking lot and I tried them out with power from my RV. They
were in sad shape. The AO's were not bad, but the Nikon was really
rough and the fine focus was seized up but it has nice "Plan"
objectives. I like a challenge so I offered $80 and he took it.
Transported them home and took the AO's apart, lubed them and got one
working quite well with a borrowed set of eyepieces from the Nikon. The
second one as an alignment problem probably beyond my ability to
calibrate. I had been using penetrating oil and wrenches on the Nikon
for days trying to free up the shaft, but to no avail.
I finally figured out how the focusing mechanism might be disassembled
on the Nikon scope and took it apart. I had nothing to loose. Got the
fine focus shaft out of it with a hammer and a punch. It was all
corroded and I think the scope had been dropped as the sleeve was
partially bend. Cleaned it all up. Used a long drill to clean out the
sleeve and a rod to straighten it out. It is now all lubed and put back
together, but I need to replace three set screws that were sheered off
either by me or by someone forcing the focus mechanism. One I have no
idea where it is suppose to go. Small metric. I will visit Tacoma
Screw on Monday to see if I can find anything, or else I will drill and
retap with SAE screws. Still have a stripped focus nob and tensioner I
need to figure out, and the fine focus eccentric bushing that has a spot
for 4 set screws but there were none in sight. I might get this thing
working after all. I took photos of the process so I knew how to put it
back together. It is pretty complex but elegant. Also a shot of the
disassembled scope.
Here is the scope disassembled:
Nikon Scope-4193 (leica-users.org)
<http://gallery.leica-users.org/v/Aram/misc/sc/Nikon+Scope-4193.jpg.html>
Then the process involved in taking apart the focusing mechanism and
then the reassembled mechanism starts here:
Nikon Scope-4178 (leica-users.org)
<http://gallery.leica-users.org/v/Aram/misc/sc/Nikon+Scope-4178.jpg.html>
Comments welcome
Aram
--
Aram Langhans
(Semi) Retired Science Teacher
& Unemployed photographer
“The Human Genome Project has proved Darwin more right than Darwin himself would ever have dared dream.” James D. Watson
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