Anyone familiar with the Bausch and Lomb Microzoom II?

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

Anyone familiar with the Bausch and Lomb Microzoom II?

Post by Scarodactyl »

Hey everyone. I came across this beauty on eBay, and when they ran their 15% off sale the other week I decided I needed to make an offer, which they accepted. Including shipping it ended up costing me 300 bucks, which I figure is a deal no matter how you slice it.
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I haven't hooked my camera up to it yet, though the convenient c-mount at the top should make that easy.

The first question I had was about this add-on between the head and the body, some sort of zoom filter:
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You can switch between 1x, 1.25x, and 1.5x. Why you'd want this on the microzoom II, which already has a 1-2x zoom knob, I am not sure. That said, while I have enjoyed playing with the zoom I have not been very impressed with the optical quality--it seems to add some bad abberations pretty quickly.

It came with 5 B&L long working distance 'industrial' objectives, though only three seem to be working well, the 2.25, the 3x and the 8x. They seem to produce nice images. The 25x seemed to give very bad, very soft images, and the reason was easy to suss out after removing it:
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I'll have a try and cleaning it but I'm not very hopeful.
The 50x looks a little bit hazy inside which may be the problem, but I noticed a lot of chromatic abberations too which I am not sure would be the result of mold?
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this image shot through the eyepiece is actually better than it looks to the eye. So I am not sure if I should try and track down a better example of this 50x objective, or if it's just going to be this way.

Still, overall it's a nice hefty scope, with a long working distance and even an erect image which should be great for some gem usage. Once I get my camera hooked up I will try and get some pictures for proper testing.

ray_parkhurst
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Post by ray_parkhurst »

I've only had good luck with the 3x and 8x objectives. The 8x in particular is very nice, though narrow coverage as expected. I think when new the others were also good, but for some reason all I've tried had bad IQ. I'm hoping you are successful with any cleaning regimen, as the lower power ones (except 2.25x, which I've never seen a good copy...you were vey lucky) are worth using.

edited to add: Looks like the original oculars were replaced, and it also appears the barrels are 30mm. This may be the change from MZ1 to MZ2. Late in the history of B&L they "upgraded" the SZ6 to 30mm (the "plus" version) and that may be timed similarly to the MZ2. I don't have any docs on the MZ2, but MZ1 for sure used 23.2mm oculars.

Scarodactyl
Posts: 1617
Joined: Sat Apr 14, 2018 10:26 am

Post by Scarodactyl »

Thanks for the info! Hopefully I'll find some that are good and reasonably priced too. There are some on eBay but who knows. One is listed as in good condition, with obvious mold as bad as the above 25x in the pictures.

Oh yes, I totally forgot to mention the eyepieces. They are indeed nonoriginal 30mm olympus stereo ones, and fit almost. I suppose that could also be a source of abberations, since I assume stereo eyepieces do basically no correction? Not sure which ones I need though.

ray_parkhurst
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Joined: Sat Nov 20, 2010 10:40 am
Location: Santa Clara, CA, USA
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Post by ray_parkhurst »

Scarodactyl wrote:Thanks for the info! Hopefully I'll find some that are good and reasonably priced too. There are some on eBay but who knows. One is listed as in good condition, with obvious mold as bad as the above 25x in the pictures.

Oh yes, I totally forgot to mention the eyepieces. They are indeed nonoriginal 30mm olympus stereo ones, and fit almost. I suppose that could also be a source of abberations, since I assume stereo eyepieces do basically no correction? Not sure which ones I need though.
I'm not sure what came with the MZ2. They introduced the UWF15x alongside the MZ1, but those are 23.2mm. You could adapt, and it might be worth it given the nice characteristics of the UWF's.

Scarodactyl
Posts: 1617
Joined: Sat Apr 14, 2018 10:26 am

Post by Scarodactyl »

Thanks. I've watched off and on for the 15x UWF eyepieces over the past few years to potentially put on my SZ7, but they seem to be pretty scarce and expensive. Would they provide a significant advantage over a natively 30mm eyepiece? I assume they aren't correcting.

I'm trying to figure out what adapter I need for direct projection on this scope. I have a 23mm eyepiece adapter that almost fits but wiggles enough that real stacking isn't going to happen. It also wasn't quite parfocal, though I'm not sure that matters since I'm going to be stacking anyway. I understand not having the camera direct attached usually has advantages for vibration isolation, but the microzoom II focuses by moving the head like a stereo scope which I assume would be a pain to deal with.

I did a few test shots on gemological subjects and got decent enough results. I still have a lot to figure out on camera settings and processing. It has enough range of motion and working distance to image inclusions inside gems. This set had a lot of movement between shots, more than helicon could handle, but I think the artifacts give it a sort of cool look anyway:
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Methane bubble inside petroleum trapped in a negative crystal cavity inside a quartz crystal, shot through the 8x objective.
Anyway, once I get things properly set up I'll take some proper photos and pop over into beginner's micro. I think for the price it'll probably be a pretty reasonable piece of equipment.
Last edited by Scarodactyl on Tue Oct 16, 2018 11:56 pm, edited 1 time in total.

Scarodactyl
Posts: 1617
Joined: Sat Apr 14, 2018 10:26 am

Post by Scarodactyl »

Please pardon my double post. The trinoc port has an adapter with two odd options. The center is a smooth hole that is almostthe diameter of a b&l eyepiece, just very slightly too big, so it can rattle a bit amd an eyepiece adapter is a touch too loose. The outside is threaded (good so far) with a diameter of 1 1/8 inches (yikes). I can't find any ready made adapters from this to anything. Is any likely to exist?
Plus side, the camera needs to sit higher for parfocality so it should be plenty feasible.

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