Thread: Compound magnification

has anyone thought of or have tried to see if this works?

I know the theory behind the compound microscope, where the 10x eye piece and the 4x objective lense will produce a magnification of 40x when you the object focused in.

So so here is the question. Since I don't have the cash to put in for a compound microscope. Not to mention they are illuminated from the bottom rather than on top. Has anyone ever tried putting two jewlers loupes in in series to produce a desired magnification?

i have a 10x and 20x loupe. And bought a usb microscope determining that the scope was useless since the resolution sucks and do better with my 20x loupe. So because of this I was thinking about just buying another cheep loupe and get better optical resolution and more magnification than I need.

Will this work or should I just experiment?

I tried compounding my jeweler's loupe but with little success.

My advice is to get a USB microscope. You can get a good one for less than $100. I think my Veho was about $70.
The plus side of a USB scope is capturing pics of what you are doing.
The down side is you have to have it connected to a PC

A lot of guys like the pocket scope of 40x. You can get these for less than $10 and they work great. The down side is you cannot record.

I use my pocket scope all the time when I am honing. It will show you how the edge is being changed.

Dave

Some companies make 'triplet' loupes. Three lenses together in the canister. I have a B&L 'Hastings" triplet 14x that is like that. I also have another B&L 'doublet' eye loupe, the kind that you stick in your eye socket and hold whatever it is you're looking at hands free of the loupe. It unscrews and comes apart with two different apertures. Together they make 11x IIRC. As far as rigging up something of your own, from two or more lenses ..... give it a shot. Might work.

I got the veho, but I have had little success getting any better of an image than my 20x loupe has given me. So with that thought. What is a good general magnification that will help me look at my SR edge. I've been working on making sure my bevel is established and for looking at the scratch patterns to see if it is time to move to the next grit. And I am of course in combination of the other established edge tests (TNT, TPT, HHT, ect)

I have a B&L stereo microscope that goes to 40x. The kind you describe in the original post, but I rarely bother with it for razors anymore, I originally got it to check tattoo needles for hooks or blunt ends. Anyway, I usually use a 20x or 30x eye loupe and that works well for me. When I use higher magnification than that, the higher I go, the worse my honing gets .......

IMO, resolution is far more important than magnification. Also, make sure you learn how to use the microscope properly; a tool is only as good/useful as it's operator.

Myself, I don't find much use in magnification.

Another advantage of the stereomicroscope is that the illumination is from above. However, lots of people are overcoming the problem of a transmission scope (what OP described) by adding a supplemental light source from above.

Problem with two jeweler's loupes idea is you need it to work as precisely as a regular microscope. Each lense has a particular plane of focus and you are going to have to work around and with those focal planes so you are going to have to experiment with keeping them properly aligned and focused. In order to hold them properly you will probably have to remove the lenses from the loupes.

If you want to play and experiment, then go for it. Otherwise, stick with what others have already figured out with regular scopes.

Well, knowing how to work a microscope is no prob considering that is an aspect of my field of expertise. However, as for what u are saying Utopian about the plane of focus, I was already considering that along with a way to try and keep things steady. I was already playing around with my loupe that I already have and the usb microscope that I mentioned before having and I was able to (difficultly I should say) increase the mag of the microscope by 50%. Hopefully playing around I might come up with something that could even be a little fun and useful at the same time. If not it will not be much of an investment. I'll keep things updated on the results on the attempt when I get the new loupes I just ordered in which only cost me ~$8.

Excellent! It sounds like you are well qualified to experiment and succed with this.
Good luck!