For the grandchildren?

ChrisR · Post by **ChrisR** » Wed Oct 18, 2017 12:54 pm

£20 microscope, with battery illumination.

https://www.maplin.co.uk/p/celestron-op ... -kit-a73uk

Pau · Post by **Pau** » Wed Oct 18, 2017 2:33 pm

I don't think so, at least if you want them loving Microscopy. My opinion is that they are so useless that they can prevent future use of microscopes.

At the high school lab we have a pair of this kind of toy microscopes, so ridiculously bad that I used them as (joke) penalization for the students that didn't follow the rules on how to use and care the true microscopes.

JohnyM · Post by **JohnyM** » Wed Oct 18, 2017 2:40 pm

Pau wrote:At the high school lab we have a pair of this kind of toy microscopes, so ridiculously bad that I used them as (joke) penalization for the students that didn't follow the rules on how to use and care the true microscopes.

I like that idea very much

lothman · Post by **lothman** » Wed Oct 18, 2017 3:57 pm

I was curious and bought one of the child bino microscopes

https://www.amazon.com/AMSCOPE-KIDS-SE1 ... B005C6HK00

it is really very good in its limitations and much more fun to use and look on insects. I got it under a German brand name Bresser. But you can find it on aliexpress.

https://www.aliexpress.com/store/produc ... 42471.html

zzffnn · Post by **zzffnn** » Wed Oct 18, 2017 4:23 pm

It is better than no microscope. And you can use it as portable field scope, if it is mainly plastic and light weight. That is how I use my AmScope plastic scopes.

It also depends on how old your grandchildren are.
For primary school age, a dissecting scope is better.
For high school age, they should be able to enjoy a better compound scope.

You also want to know what their subject of interest is and that may determine the scope type. Do they want to see single cell protists, or insects/minerals?

Charles Krebs · Post by **Charles Krebs** » Wed Oct 18, 2017 7:26 pm

I agree that low power is the way to go with young kids. It would be nice to have a low power (10X to 30X) monocular scope. My experience has been that with stereo scopes the trickiest part is getting the kids to use a proper interpupillary settings, and for some reason they always seem to reach up and try to focus using the focusable eyepiece (thus messing up the focus between the two eyepieces). If you've got more than one kid using it you can be guaranteed that you will need to regularly monitor and reset binocular eyepiece settings.

In some respects I have actually had better luck with a basic monocular "compound scope" with a 4X objective.

Smokedaddy · Post by **Smokedaddy** » Wed Oct 18, 2017 9:25 pm

I found two of these on eBay for my grandkids. They should clean up nicely and I have a condenser for one of them. Only paid $39.00 for everything plus shipping of course. I realize they're not complete.

Olympusman · Post by **Olympusman** » Thu Oct 19, 2017 8:13 am

I buy fine old microscopes to restore at www.shopgoodwill.com
Use the search term "microscope" You will be surprised at what is available. A few years ago I got a very nice Bausch&Lomb at a Goodwill store for $24.

Mike

For the grandchildren?

For the grandchildren?

For the grandkids