david weaver

I have been delving into more natural stones lately, something I can't dispense with for some reason. And my little $12 scope has served me well in sharpening razors that I sell - just making sure the edge is even, but as I get better at sharpening razors (it sounds ridiculous, but you do get better at it with various stones because they don't all work the same way), the results from different things get closer together.

In order to see the difference, I've ordered a metallurgical microscope with a camera mount. I was a little bit disappointed to find that there aren't any cheap, and even one from india (which is where I ordered from) at a relatively low true power (600x in this case) is about $450 delivered, but sometimes you just feel the need to satisfy curiosity, and I want something good enough to take pictures looking into an edge.

Nothing new, there are edge pictures with SEM, but they get so close in that the effect can be the opposite - it's difficult to tell when something that's really smooth isn't rough, because at high enough magnification, every edge looks terrible.

I'm hoping this thing will get a good view of wood and stone surfaces, too, to study the stones and the wood surfaces, etc, and just as a device for my kids to view things that you can't see in a biological microscope.