Smartphone microscope

We made this microscope stage for a smartphone( or tablet) last week.

http://m.instructables.com/id/10-Smartphone-to-digital-microscope-conversion/all/

And I have a few things to say.

-Those pictures on that instructable site were all stolen from google or wherever. It works- I guess. But we didn't get images *that* good.

-I'm not a very experienced power tool person. I built benches for our table- yes. But I cut the circular saw cord (with the circular saw) in the process. So take that into consideration when I tell you this next part...
-the plexiglass had these veiny stress fractures coming from the drill site. I followed the directions and maybe they wouldn't have shown up if I had used a sharper drill bit? Dunno.
- we thought a bigger specimen stage would be smart. Nope. It's hard to manipulate the specimen when it's in the middle of a large stage that is pressed pretty closely to the lens stage.
- we made the lens stage larger so we could use the iPad. And that worked out well.
- we drilled 5/16 holes to match our 5/16 bolts. But they were just a *bit* off. And I told max, trying to put two points in line isn't hard, but that third point needs to be EXACT or you are going to have hang ups. So that third point was hanging us up. So I drilled larger holes. I think 3/8?-1/2?
But now the specimen stage wobbles BC the bolts have soooo much room. And a wobbling specimen is not a great thing when you are all magnified and up close.
- we used two lenses. One smack on top of another for a bigger magnification. We used gorilla glue to hold them in place.
- we did not, however, make sure we had clean hands and worked in a clean environment, so whatever specimen we are looking at has permanent flecks of something or other that are sandwiched between the two lenses.
We took pictures of sprite's feather to give you an idea of how it looked.
The kids enjoyed it.
We enjoyed making it.
And the cool thing is I bought an extra laser pointer just to play with. We play with Alice, and John. We also scare the crows (and sometimes sprite). And sometimes we actually use it to point things out.


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