I had a chance to look at some friends' Leitz Diavert and thought it was a very interesting inverted 'scope. Then one came up on eBay, so I couldn't resist it. Here is the instrument as it came:
The condenser in this configuration is 0.25NA, mounted directly on the lower part of the lighting unit and, with low magnification objectives, this is fine. The Diavert manual shows that the 0.25NA condenser can be removed and a higher NA condenser mounted in an additional condenser holder:
I don't have one of these and my budget has been spent (for spent, read overspent)! I do have an extensive bits box, however. In it was a spare Zeiss condenser mounting ring, and having a number of Zeiss microscopes I also have a selection of condensers. Could I improvise something?
The next picture shows that I could...
And here it is dismounted:
I made a dovetail and spacer block by laminating 60 thou polystyrene plastic card. The pictures show the assembly as first made and you can see the laminations. I expect I will tidy it up by finishing it better and maybe giving it a coat of paint. A Zeiss brass dovetail and rack are mounted on the front of the assembly. Eventually I will add a filter tray for DG stops or phase contrast annuli.
The assembly is surprisingly rigid for plastic and seems perfectly adequate.
Here it is in situ, below, but you may notice another oddity. Those budget restrictions mean that I shouldn't buy myself a Leitz FSA trinocular head to replace the binocular head. In an idle moment I noticed that the mounting rings for the Zeiss trinocular heads appear to be the same size as the Leitz one on the binocular head.
Wrong!! - the Leitz head fits my Zeiss stands beautifully and gives a very good image, BUT the Zeiss mounting ring is a smidgeon too big to fit the Leitz.
I don't have a lathe available, besides setting the ring up in a four jaw chuck accurately enough to skim off a few thou would be a tedious business. Maybe I could carefully file the ring down? Frustration again: the ring is made of a very hard steel and files just skid. I therefore stoned the ring down by hand using a carborundum stone intended for sharpening steel blades.
It fitted!! - the ring recess is not quite as deep as the Leitz ring, but the sprung nylon retaining lugs hold it perfectly well. The image looks good, although I need to take a few test shots, which I hope to post here just to prove it really works.
All that remains now, apart from some photo testing, is to make an adapter so that I can plug my Y fibre optic into the lamp mounting to replace the filament lamp and permit flash photography.
It looks like it should be a versatile setup.
Leitz Diavert adaptations
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Leitz Diavert adaptations
Graham
Though we lean upon the same balustrade, the colours of the mountain are different.
Though we lean upon the same balustrade, the colours of the mountain are different.
- Cactusdave
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