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If you go to aliexpress and type in 40x25 jewelers loupe you can get a 40X Loupe and I have a few for myself for doing electronic's repair for reading really small resistors.
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Price is$300$250 ea (shipped within CONUS). If you live outside the US, I will contact you after your order for extra shipping charges.
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Suggest a microscope for examining my edge
- Thread starter river251
- Start date
cudgee
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You have had plenty of help. Just my thoughts, i tried my nephews microscope, completely useless. I bought a 40 magnification hand held magnifying glass for $13 Aus. on a well known internet seller. Makes a huge difference for my requirements, but that is just me. If i can give some advise, don't over think it or make sharpening to complicated. If your knife does what you want it to do, that is all you need.
Hi all, thought I'd post a few things as a followup. I agree with cudgee about making things too complicated, but I feel like I'm already down the rabbit hole, and looking for something very cheap that can end the search.
I created a playlist of 41 videos on youtube on microscopes and knife edges. I don't know how to link it, but I am L5man on youtube and the playlist is public, called Edge Scopes.
But really these are the best two, and I don't think you will get much more from the rest. They are about the Pluggable and the Celestron 5mp.
And I was thinking I'd go this way. Then I tried my plastic magnifying glass with a small 10x circle in the bottom, and that was actually pretty good. So I thought maybe I'll just get a high quality loup.
But chance caused me to go a different way. Diemaker above's story about the Zeiss he inherited was intriguing. I know you are not supposed to be able to use a compound microscope to view solid stuff, but I think his Zeiss must have been a compound, and it worked for for him.
Then I came across this:
https://www.greatscopes.com/act009.htm
which seemed to provide further encouragement. Then I came across this further encouraging thread:
https://knife.wickededgeusa.com/forums/topic/microscope-test-aka-the-scope-showdown/page/2/
So I was leaning toward trying a compound. Wickededge's pictures at 2000x had to be from a compound. No other kind of optical can do 2000x.
And then I happened across this, and I placed my order. Check the price and shipping. But also check the feedback and item location and where it's coming from. I hope I've not got something that can't work, or worse am being a real sucker, but...well....
https://www.ebay.com/itm/143290314846
Time will tell.
I created a playlist of 41 videos on youtube on microscopes and knife edges. I don't know how to link it, but I am L5man on youtube and the playlist is public, called Edge Scopes.
But really these are the best two, and I don't think you will get much more from the rest. They are about the Pluggable and the Celestron 5mp.
And I was thinking I'd go this way. Then I tried my plastic magnifying glass with a small 10x circle in the bottom, and that was actually pretty good. So I thought maybe I'll just get a high quality loup.
But chance caused me to go a different way. Diemaker above's story about the Zeiss he inherited was intriguing. I know you are not supposed to be able to use a compound microscope to view solid stuff, but I think his Zeiss must have been a compound, and it worked for for him.
Then I came across this:
https://www.greatscopes.com/act009.htm
which seemed to provide further encouragement. Then I came across this further encouraging thread:
https://knife.wickededgeusa.com/forums/topic/microscope-test-aka-the-scope-showdown/page/2/
So I was leaning toward trying a compound. Wickededge's pictures at 2000x had to be from a compound. No other kind of optical can do 2000x.
And then I happened across this, and I placed my order. Check the price and shipping. But also check the feedback and item location and where it's coming from. I hope I've not got something that can't work, or worse am being a real sucker, but...well....
https://www.ebay.com/itm/143290314846
Time will tell.
Last edited:
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I've wondered that more than once. I bought some caps for the valve stems on the car. From China off ebay. They had peace signs in the middle. I was the only bidder at .24 cents. Sure as heck about 3 weeks later in the mail, there they are. Theres no way even for something silly like that, that you can make money mailing something from China to here. (Kansas)
cudgee
Gold Member
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- May 13, 2019
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It will arrive. One thing that they are good at is delivery. BUT do let us all know how good it is. I am sure everyone else is as intrigued as i am, a-if it works, and b-how the hell they can make them and sell them for that price. My first thought were, that they have to be junk. So do let us all know. Have a good week-end.
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My valve caps are about 1.5 years old now and still have the chrome and the peace signs so some times ya get lucky. I'm real curious too how it turns out.
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- Jan 15, 2015
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In order to look at solid objects, you need the light to come in from the top. That one only has light source from the bottom, for transparent samples.
See for example https://www.amscope.com/compound-microscopes/trinocular-metallurgical-microscope-40x-640x.html
you can see the light source at the back, coming into the body above the objective lenses.
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At work we have an Amscope metallurgical microscope 1000x (claims 1600 but that's with decreasing resolution).
It is expensive (approx $800 nearly a decade ago), I would never have bought one out of my own pocket, but man it sure gave me an education re edge dubbing from stropping, plane deviation from freehand sharpening and using various media, along edge variation at different grit finishes and different angles, what is really happening when using a smooth steel, carbide pull-through, improvised burnishing methods and a host of other cool observations.
Backlighting the image brings out the sharpness along the apex when viewed from the side (soft overhead lighting, bright backlighting), and this gives you a quick way to estimate edge flatness - also if you have clear focus of scratch troughs right to the apex or not.
At 1000x most will need oil immersion, which only increases the pain. I managed at one time to build a berm around the edge and get images at a 45° angle at 1000x. Most of the time 400x is plenty for studying scratch pattern specifics, and really a 20x loupe and cut testing will tell you 99% of what's useful from a practical standpoint. To really do science on an edge you need an electron microscope and even they can have problems delivering a true representative image of the edge in terms of the perceived angle matching reality.
It is expensive (approx $800 nearly a decade ago), I would never have bought one out of my own pocket, but man it sure gave me an education re edge dubbing from stropping, plane deviation from freehand sharpening and using various media, along edge variation at different grit finishes and different angles, what is really happening when using a smooth steel, carbide pull-through, improvised burnishing methods and a host of other cool observations.
Backlighting the image brings out the sharpness along the apex when viewed from the side (soft overhead lighting, bright backlighting), and this gives you a quick way to estimate edge flatness - also if you have clear focus of scratch troughs right to the apex or not.
At 1000x most will need oil immersion, which only increases the pain. I managed at one time to build a berm around the edge and get images at a 45° angle at 1000x. Most of the time 400x is plenty for studying scratch pattern specifics, and really a 20x loupe and cut testing will tell you 99% of what's useful from a practical standpoint. To really do science on an edge you need an electron microscope and even they can have problems delivering a true representative image of the edge in terms of the perceived angle matching reality.
I thought people might intrested in how the $12 Ebay microscope is turning out. I just looked at the item in my purchase history and it was replaced by this. I called Ebay and they opened a case on it but could not tell me why the seller was removed, so I will get my refund if it doesn't arrive. Seems like a straight case of take the money for no product until Ebay stops me. Wonder how many rupees they got?
Too bad, but it was interesting to see.
I took a screenshot of the item in my purchase history but can not find a way to put it in this post. It shows "this seller has been removed":, "your item has been shipped," $12.00, and the item number, and the seller name. No pic of the microscope or anything mentioning it.
Too bad, but it was interesting to see.
I took a screenshot of the item in my purchase history but can not find a way to put it in this post. It shows "this seller has been removed":, "your item has been shipped," $12.00, and the item number, and the seller name. No pic of the microscope or anything mentioning it.
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Probably the same guy I bought my Wicked Edge 130 for 9.95 a few months ago, yeah, I ended up with a refund,lol
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I really like Dino Lite's stuff, they make good USB scopes!
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Mine is outdated now so it's no longer made, but it is 230x and does just fine. not the highest resolution but gives you a good idea what's going on at the edge.
