Well I spent a good part of the day moving stuff in the basement so I can get to my junkyard of a bench, and then actually rebuild parts of some scopes. Heck I MAY not need the one I just bought!!!
Below, one of the original scopes, an antique Spencer. The base is VERY heavy. These are the pieces not used, the old boom, focusing rack, and scope head
The reason the old Spencer has to go is the field of view is narrow, the shortest objective, at 1.X is still "too much" and besides...............
I had just the boom and head mount of a newer series, you can put different heads in this holder. But to get it to focus, it had to get the objective closer to the bench (or raise the work) The original stand column had a step, so I machined that down, the brass area, so the boom mount would go lower on the stand. The stand column has a rack to raise it, so it will still go up some
The new head had to mount like this to get it close enough to the bench, but the clamp screw was then hidden from access. I milled a half round in the yoke so I can access the clamp screw
"Roughed" together and working. This is a zoom head, the smallest eyepieces I have are a set of 9X and a set of wide field 10X. They are more than plenty even at the minimum, .7X zoom. With the head focused at working height, I can get my hand "on edge" between the work surface and the objective, so maybe 3"--4" working room
Now I am going to spend most of this week practicing "back up to speed" on soldering, desoldering, etc............and of course await the "new" scope from ebay.........which I may not need!!!!!
