Re: Looking for compound Microscope

On Sun, 12 Oct 2008 13:22:28 -0700 (PDT), Kevin Cunningham
<smskjc@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:

On Oct 12, 2:32 pm, TaNaKa <shu...@xxxxxxxx> wrote:
Well, I don't know where is the other message I post some weeks ago,
but... anyway, first of all sorry for not respond before but as I said
in my first message I haven't got Internet access at home and it was
impossible to me get access until now.
Thank you very much for your help Kevin... I did just what you said. I
contacted one of my doctors and he was able to put me in contact with
two of his colleages and with their help I manage to find and old
Olympus BH-2, not in very good condition but cheaper than I though. It
has only two DPlan Achromats 4X and 10X objectives, so now I need to
find better objectives to improve it's quality. Maybe is not the best
microscope in the world but I am quite happy. I just bought a 40X and
a 100X oil Splan Achromats objectives but my intention in a no far
future is gradually to get SPlan Apocromats optics. The microscope has
a tinocular tube, so I could take photographs to share with the rest
of the forum.

Another think I need is a microtome and chemicals to stain the
sections. For the first I think a rotary microtome would the best
option. My intention is start observing botanical sections (Botany was
what I studied when I was at university) but also animal tissues and
protozoos. I've  been searching the Net and I found some information
about the "American Optical 820" Microtome. It seems to be quite old
machine but I don't mind if it works. :-) Anyone know this machine and
could tell me if it's possible to get a not too much expensive one
that works here in Europe? The few I could locate through the net were
in USA and the shipping cost where almost as expensive as the machine
itself due to its weight... around 70 pounds.  And for the second one
anyone knows a  good online where I could buy the chemicals I will
need (fixatives, xylene, stains, etc)?

Well, I will be on holiday the next 6 days so I will have I little
time to look for and to read the forum too. Sorry the lenght o the
message and for my horrible English too.

Thanks a lot!!

Jose

On 7 sep, 22:43, Kevin Cunningham <sms...@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:

Jose,

The brand names you suggest are all junk.  You should buy a used Zeiss
(Opton), E. Leitz or Leica, Olympus or Nikon.  I know that there are
several dealers in Germany that sell quality used 'scopes. You could
talk to you local hospital about how they get rid of their old
equipment, that could be a real help.

Thanks,

Kevin Cunningham
SMS

Glad you got the BH-2, I know it well, a great microscope.

I doubt that you would really want to produce your own slides. The
costs are far, far more than you realize. The real cost is the safety
cost. You need storage bins with all the safety features so you can
store chemicals. Then you need to purchase some relatively bad
chemicals like zylene, a class three carcinogen. Then there are
environmental dangers like air flow that you have to get right. And
the list goes on and on. Plus you need a lot of instruction to be a
good cutter. There are very sever differences between soft tissue of
various kinds, muscle, bone and what's really fun is when one specimen
contains all the types.

It's better to either look at prepared slides from a quality slide
maker or have your slides prepared for you for a fair price. The
other thing is were are you getting your specimens? The only place
you can get human is yourself and that is bound to cause problems.
Veterinary specimens are possible but you will need dissection tools
at least then you have all the other problems. I'd take a long look
at this before moving into histology.

Thanks,

Kevin Cunningha

Also botany is a interesting field for microscopy and it is possible
to obtain a lot of fresh sections of plant tissues.

.

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