Tritium Illuminated Reticle Eyepiece

Wanna make a scope? Or better still, grind a mirror yourself. Or, you have some good tips in making a really useful accessory? This is the place to show what your hands can do...
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cataclysm
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Tritium Illuminated Reticle Eyepiece

Post by cataclysm »

This thought came to my mind when I was toying with the idea of marking my equipments in the field with a more reliable light source that negates the use of battries. Better still, if I can find some small enough, would be able to insert them into crosshairs eyepiece, which I did.
Managed to get hold these tiny 5mm TGLS (tritium gas light source) vials or more commonly known as Beta Light from a shop at Funan. It was sold as a keyring and encapsulated clear cylindrical plastic, requires some careful cutting to extract the tiny vials.
Beta light illumination has a widespred application in military optics, but yet to came across any manufacturers producing them for astronomy. So I experimented it on my good old 9mm Meade Plossl and it really works!!

Here are some pictures:

The vials are really tiny, just 5mm in length x 1.5mm diameter, really delicate to handle.
Image

The Meade eyepiece has a centering optical block with etched reticles, this is where I inserted the luminous vials.
Image

Requires 2 vials for sufficient illumination. As compare to original red LED illuminator, they are still quite a fair bit dimmer.
Image
Success!! Took this directly through the ocular with my camera and macro lens, with 30s exposure in a dimmed room.
Image
Last edited by cataclysm on Thu May 03, 2012 3:51 pm, edited 1 time in total.
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Gary
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Re: Tritium Illuminated Reticle Eyepiece

Post by Gary »

OMG! Cool! Tony Stark in the making! :)
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Bergkamp_
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Re: Tritium Illuminated Reticle Eyepiece

Post by Bergkamp_ »

headshot!!
Wee Ern aRmeD wiF Telescope reAdY tO taKe ovEr thE skY .. wIF jUst mY naKed eYEs .
alweek
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Re: Tritium Illuminated Reticle Eyepiece

Post by alweek »

Genius! Did the eyepiece have slots in the side for the tritium tubes or did you cut them?
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Clifford60
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Re: Tritium Illuminated Reticle Eyepiece

Post by Clifford60 »

Kelvin, be careful now that the TGLS is outside the protective holder, never crack it. Also hope that you after seeing a long time thru the eyepiece, your eye don't turn green. hahaha

Anyway, great idea, just make sure you protect the TGLS.
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cataclysm
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Re: Tritium Illuminated Reticle Eyepiece

Post by cataclysm »

alweek wrote:Genius! Did the eyepiece have slots in the side for the tritium tubes or did you cut them?
Hi alweek, yes I cut the slots with Dremel cutting tool, and the vials are properly secured with clear epoxy.
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cataclysm
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Re: Tritium Illuminated Reticle Eyepiece

Post by cataclysm »

Clifford60 wrote:Kelvin, be careful now that the TGLS is outside the protective holder, never crack it. Also hope that you after seeing a long time thru the eyepiece, your eye don't turn green. hahaha

Anyway, great idea, just make sure you protect the TGLS.
Hi Clifford, thanks for the safety reminder. Indeed the Tritium is mildly radioactive ( essentially beta particle ), but even when the vials are broken, the radiation is too weak just to penetrate your skin. Inhaling, ingesting it may pose a higher health risk, but at that minuscule amount, you have to ingest a lot of them to pose any health risk. By now, the vials are securely set, firmly embedded within the reticle block with clear epoxy. :P
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weixing
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Re: Tritium Illuminated Reticle Eyepiece

Post by weixing »

Hi,
Nice DIY job. Had you try in a real dark environment? Just wonder will the light leak into the FoV? Anyway, I think a red one might better... ha ha ha

Have a nice day.
Yang Weixing
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cataclysm
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Re: Tritium Illuminated Reticle Eyepiece

Post by cataclysm »

Hi Weixing, yet to try it on an actual dark site, but I think it will work. There is some light leak, but the illumination is so feeble that it hardly affect the contrast of the viewing. Agree that red light would be more ideal, but their output is very dim, only about 20% as bright as the green. As you can see from the pic, I actually needed 2 green vials to provide sufficient illumination. :mryellow:
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