Dane.Kouttron
[5.14.17] [SuperQuick]
Baush&Lomb Microscope Light Upgrade
  This is a quick design
for a printed adapter for the Baush & Lomb stereo
zoom 7 microscope, along with some details about the
microscope. In the past I had tried out 'attaching an led
strip' to the bottom of miscellaneous scopes, to varying
success, but the advent of low cost ring lights
dramatically improves lighting for tiny IC's and re-flow
work (now shadows). |
Quick Intro to the
Bausch & Lomb 'Stereo Zoom 7'
|
  The Baush & Lomb
series of 'big angry 1980's microscope on an offset
heavy arm' are really quite excellent for SMD
component install and soldering. They also commonly
appear in laboratory clean-outs and industrial
auctions. |
  This one in particular
came from a lab clean-out, and has seen, some use. It
was missing the eyepieces, but fortunately, they are
standard. The ever-excellent peter crufted some from
the ether and lo, they work great. These use
23mm optic mounts, which are fairly common [amazon] [ebay]. There's an
excellent tear-down thread [here] |
  A copy of the series
manual is available locally here [link]. This conveniently
provides some excellent imagery into the innards of
the microscope assembly. |
Ebay Ring Light and
adapter
|
  There are a number of
ring light adapters floating about the multiverse, I
opted for this [link] one |
  The innards of this
particular led ring light are better than I expected.
Normally ~5w mains connected leds use a capacitive dropper
based supply [link]. While capacitive droppers
do work, however, they are non-isolated and the
giant-film-cap to drive the leds can be a bit bulky. I
think, as this is marketed as a 110/220 mains
adaptable supply, they opted for the tiny-switcher
approach. Capacitive droppers also exhibit the
'quite blinky' issues |
  Yowza, its not just a
capacitive dropper. The IC that runs the led driver is
a dk106, [local link]. Its actually rated
for 85-265vac operation, which explains the '110/220'
capability. It runs from rectified mains and twiddles
a transformer, using an optocopuler as voltage
feedback. |
 Its
actually pretty bright too. The adjust pot is smooth and
there is no characteristic 'low duty cycle flicker'
which occurs on a number of dimmable things where their
internal switching frequency, plus low adjust setpoint
result in an increasingly viewable flicker. |
Printed
Adapter
|
 The Amscope was intended
to have an external illuminator, or eyepiece based
illuminator. The manual mentions a ring-illuminator,
using a flourescent ring lamp, but i'm not sure how
that mates. Ah well, this is a quite-good job for 3d
printed parts: Weird geometry, not super structural,
and quick. |
  And with some
hand-waving, a printed part appears. There's only
really 2 screw holes to pickup on the bottom face of
the microscope, both 4-40 thread. I opted to
under-size the ring mount such that the screws had
some travel into the ring to grab the part. The large
flat surface is for doublesided tape / hotmelt glue to
add some extra holding force to the scope adapter. |
TADA
  The 4-40 screws I had on
hand were a bit long, so instead of playing games with
a hacksaw, I added an extra 4-40 hex nut to take up
the extra space. |
  This leaves
the brightness adjust pot right in the front, with the
on/off switch to the side. |
  This was
taken with a Panasonic GF-3 pointed at the normal
eyepiece optic, but yes, the illumination works great.
Shown is an Atmega 16u2 and a business card with
tiny font. |
Solidpart files
|
Here are the
cad files for this printed part. I used an UP! Mini to
print the part. Download
below!
  [Solidworks 2014]
[stl]
[igs] |
Concluding Remarks:
- 3d printers and cad make engineering great again
If you have questions or comments, ask below or send over an
email.
Dane.Kouttron
Rensselaer Polytechnic
Institute
Electrical & Electrical
Power
631.978.1650
This is a quick design
for a printed adapter for the Baush & Lomb stereo
zoom 7 microscope, along with some details about the
microscope. In the past I had tried out 'attaching an led
strip' to the bottom of miscellaneous scopes, to varying
success, but the advent of low cost ring lights
dramatically improves lighting for tiny IC's and re-flow
work (now shadows). 
The Baush & Lomb
series of 'big angry 1980's microscope on an offset
heavy arm' are really quite excellent for SMD
component install and soldering. They also commonly
appear in laboratory clean-outs and industrial
auctions. 
This one in particular
came from a lab clean-out, and has seen, some use. It
was missing the eyepieces, but fortunately, they are
standard. The ever-excellent peter crufted some from
the ether and lo, they work great. These use
23mm optic mounts, which are fairly common [amazon] [ebay]. There's an
excellent tear-down thread [here]
A copy of the series
manual is available locally here [link]. This conveniently
provides some excellent imagery into the innards of
the microscope assembly. 
There are a number of
ring light adapters floating about the multiverse, I
opted for this [link] one
The innards of this
particular led ring light are better than I expected.
Normally ~5w mains connected leds use a capacitive dropper
based supply [link]. While capacitive droppers
do work, however, they are non-isolated and the
giant-film-cap to drive the leds can be a bit bulky. I
think, as this is marketed as a 110/220 mains
adaptable supply, they opted for the tiny-switcher
approach. Capacitive droppers also exhibit the
'quite blinky' issues 
Yowza, its not just a
capacitive dropper. The IC that runs the led driver is
a dk106, [local link]. Its actually rated
for 85-265vac operation, which explains the '110/220'
capability. It runs from rectified mains and twiddles
a transformer, using an optocopuler as voltage
feedback. 
Its
actually pretty bright too. The adjust pot is smooth and
there is no characteristic 'low duty cycle flicker'
which occurs on a number of dimmable things where their
internal switching frequency, plus low adjust setpoint
result in an increasingly viewable flicker. 
[Solidworks 2014]