Carbon rod holder

Abstract

This item is a carbon rod holder. Carbon rods held by this item are used for pretreatment of electron microscope observations, such as those using scanning electron microscopes and electron probe microanalyzers. This pretreatment involves evaporating the tip of the carbon rod to deposit carbon on the surface of the observation object. The tip of the carbon rod to be evaporated is sharpened into a cone shape with the shaft at the apex. This cone shape is achieved using a rotary handle pencil sharpener. If a carbon rod is inserted into a rotary handle pencil sharpener without a carbon rod holder, for example, if the carbon rod is 100 mm long, 60 mm will fit within the sharpener's clip. This means that if 40 mm of the carbon rod is used, it will no longer be able to be held by the sharpener's clip. In this case, the carbon rod must be discarded, even though 60 mm remains. On the other hand, using this carbon rod holder reduces the amount of carbon rod waste compared to when a carbon rod holder is not used, thereby increasing the utilization rate of the carbon rod. When using this product, the upper cover holder and the lower receiving holder are screwed together from above with flat screws, and a cylindrical carbon rod with a conical tip is clamped and fixed in the cylindrical notches in both holders. As shown in the bottom view of the cover holder and the top view of the receiving holder, the cylindrical notches have two widths, allowing for the accommodation of carbon rods of two different thicknesses. Furthermore, by inserting flat screws into the two flat portions, the carbon rod can be inserted into the insertion hole of a rotary handle pencil sharpener without the flat screw head interfering with the hole. Furthermore, a flat washer is sandwiched between the mating surfaces of the cover holder and receiving holder on one of the flat screws farthest from the carbon rod. This allows the carbon rod to be gripped at one end of the upper and lower insertion sections, similar to the gripping of a piece of chopsticks or tweezers, increasing the holding pressure and enabling a more secure grip of the carbon rod. In addition, handle-rotating pencil sharpeners use a system in which the sharpening blade, operated by a planetary gear, is installed at an angle and rotates around the pencil to sharpen it.In this design, taking this method into consideration, the outer diameter of the carbon rod holder is tapered toward the front so that it does not interfere with the sharpening blade. Specifically, a taper is set on the outer circumference of the carbon rod holder at an angle (6 degrees in this design) that does not interfere with the sharpening blade. By tapering the outer diameter from near the center toward the front of both the cover holder and the receiving holder, the impact of the carbon rod holder's interference with the sharpening blade is reduced, and the carbon rod and carbon rod holder can be inserted deeper into the insertion hole of the handle-tight pencil sharpener. In this design, the carbon rod and carbon rod holder can be inserted 10 mm deeper into the insertion hole of the handle-tight pencil sharpener than if there was no taper.

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