Hello,
My company is moving from one facility to another and I am trying to figure out the best way to move our Keyence confocal microscope without damaging anything. I read through the sections covering transport in the manual and the main suggestion it gives is to place it back in its original packaging. I asked around and it turns out that we do not have the packaging it came in.
I am sure others have transported delicate scientific equipment before; if you have any prior experience, could you explain briefly what safety precautions should be met and what concerns should be placed into consideration? We are having a moving company transport the equipment by truck.
If this topic is not allowed, please remove it.
Thank you,
Serafin M.
I don’t have a confocal but ‘in general’ I would remove all objectives and put them in their special suspend screw cap cases and then stop up the objective turret holes with screw in stoppers (to avoid dust or particles getting in). Likewise remove the eyepieces, put them into their own protective screw cases and stopper up the eyepiece tubes. Remove the head from the body (and stopper up the exposed apertures). Basically - dismantle all the scope’s modules and stopper up the holes to avoid dust etc getting into the optics. Then pack each module separately in such a way that they can’t receive sharp shocks and jolts during transport - lots of adequate foam or similar padding. Keep everything in one or more sturdy cases - make sure no component can reach the inside edge of a case without shock absorbing packaging in between, Ensure all packages are labelled as fragile with the correct way up stickers and transport them as carefully as you can. If using a third party transport service make sure they are insured. That is how I would do it in general with my own scopes. However you should check with whoever is going to pick up the tab if anything gets broken in case they have their own special rules (for example your insurers - otherwise they might not pay up if something gets damaged during transport). If you don’t even have the special screw cap protective cases for the objectives and eyepieces - then I would not transport it till I have acquired the equivalent or compatible cases from someone. There may be some other special requirements re confocals due to the sensitive finely balanced scanning equipment so I wouldn’t just go ahead and apply what I’ve said to your machine until you’ve discussed it with someone who has experience with confocals.
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