A pig in a poke: mystery objective

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Scarodactyl
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Joined: Sat Apr 14, 2018 10:26 am

A pig in a poke: mystery objective

Post by Scarodactyl »

Like most of us quarantine has me a bit antsy. And like many I am spending even more time on eBay than usual, looking at more obscure listings hoping for a deal.
Last week I came across this listing:
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An old wafer inspection(?) System of some sort. It's big and heavy, and only cost 150 shipped. The thing I was interested in was, of course, the objective. Sure looks like a mitty, but why is it covered? It's on an olympus monocular head, why would you dp that with a mitty? Is there even a tube lens in this setup??
Well, maybe it was dumb but I went ahead and bought it. The cover is just a collar held on with two set screws.

Drum roll please.
Image



Image
Whoo!
Overall the cosmetics are good. I already have a 10x, so I could do a quick informal look with them side by side and performance seems good, maybe a bit better than my copy. So I will chalk this up as a win.

Lou Jost
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Post by Lou Jost »

Good find! Congratulations. Ebay is an amazing treasure trove and time-absorber.

Scarodactyl
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Joined: Sat Apr 14, 2018 10:26 am

Post by Scarodactyl »

Thanks! These eBay gambles don't always pay off but it's bice when they do.
Oddly there is no tube lens in the head or above the objective. There are a few lenses in the eyepiece-to-c-mount adapter. Hard to imagine but maybe there's a very short fl lens in there projecting onto a very small sensor?
Nothing about this setup makes much sense to me. Much of it is clearly custom made. I am not sure why you'd need to look at a rotating stage from the side but it spins freely and easily. I imagine I will find some use for it.

houstontx
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Post by houstontx »

looks similar setup to a pipette grinder :
http://products.narishige-group.com/gro ... glish.html

Scarodactyl
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Post by Scarodactyl »

Oh yeah, that does look extremely similar. If it's not that it must be something in the same ballpark. Thanks for the link!

As a side-note, the seller also has this one listed.
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Looks kinda cool, even has a metallurgical objective (though not a mitty, too short and obviously RMS threaded with no adapter). Something looks odd about it though....
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I.......oh no.
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I think I'm going to be sick.




The weird thing is that almost looks kind of intentional, but I can't imagine why.

Lou Jost
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Post by Lou Jost »

Maybe that corner needed to be cut off for the objective to rotate into position when the turret is turned? Maybe whatever it was imaging was in a tight space. It's the outer edge that was removed, which would be the edge that would hit something when the turret is rotated, and that objective has longer straight sides than the other objectives, which taper more, so the other ones would be moe likely to clear an obstacle when the turret is rotated.

Anyway that's my theory.

MarkSturtevant
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Post by MarkSturtevant »

Still, why couldn't they just grind out a channel in whatever was in the path of the lens.
Mark Sturtevant
Dept. of Still Waters

Lou Jost
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Post by Lou Jost »

It might have been something important, or something harder to grind than the objective?

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