Chris Jones wrote:

wrote:


Chris Jones wrote:

so i am thinking a good 5x desktop magnifier lamp (about 30 dollars)
and a decent 3x magnifier (about 10 dollars) both with about 6 to 8
inch focal length should provide enough to at least do soic's. I say
this cause my 2.5x/2x compound is almost good enough for bigger soic's
so the 3x/5x compound might be enough to handle quad flat packs (those
100+ pin IC's you see on PC motherboards etc. ).

surface mount stuff? In fact, any sort of magnification including diy
microscopes would be okay.


Try this:
http://www.funsci.com/fun3_en/uzoom/uzoom.htm
I have not built one but holding up a camara lens to a pair of
binoculars gave me a promising image.
Chris




thanks very much for the link. Exactly what i was looking for. When you
held up the camera lens to the binoculars, was the image reversed by
any chance? The design in the link calls for twin prisms. Just
wondering if excluding the prisms might cause a flipping of the image.

Thanks again

Can't remember and I don't have time to try it again tonight, sorry. If
you
have any success please post your results. I have bought a microscope now
but I'm still curious about what can be achieved for little money. I
bought some quite reasonable Meade 10x50 binoculars for £10 (about $15)
recently from a supermarket called Lidl in the UK. I was thinking of
making a microscope one day.

Chris

I tried it again, a standard SLR lens (58mm focal length) with the "film"
end of the lens towards the object and the other end pressed up against one
lens of the binoculars. The image was the right way up, and the
magnification was very impressive. You just need some powerful
illumination and you'll be soldering 0201 resistors in no time.

Chris