Cleaning the Optical Windows

CCD cameras are notoriously sensitive to dust and condensation, so you will often find evidence of &#;dust do-nuts&#; etc. in your images. These will be much easier to see if you have a lot of sky background from light pollution and image at high F ratios, but may not be noticed at all when imaging with wide aperture lenses from a dark site. Large dust shadows will usually be due to dust on the outer window of the camera and are pretty easy to eliminate with a gentle wipe of the window, but smaller and darker shadows are caused by dust on the CCD faceplate and are more difficult to deal with. The first line of defense is to apply &#;flat fields&#; to your images, as these will also fix any vignetting in the optics and do not involve any dismantling of the camera, but in bad cases you may have no alternative to opening the barrel and cleaning off the dust. If you are certain that you must clean the CCD, then please follow the instructions below. The pictures show an SXV-H9 being dismantled, but all SX cameras have a similar construction.

For more information, please visit our website.

WARNING! Cleaning the CCD is not very difficult, if you have the right materials and take reasonable care, but you do run a risk of scratching the glass or making the situation even worse. If you are not sure of your ability to do the job, either use flat fields to remove the shadows or ask Starlight Xpress to do the cleaning job for you.

For more information, please visit ruiqi.

The materials that you will need

The microfibre cloth is available from photographic stores and the heat sink grease can be bought in small tubes from computer stores etc.
You will also find a powerful lens and a bright light to be very useful.

For more Optical Glass Windowinformation, please contact us. We will provide professional answers.