Arkay Speed Dodge Printer

I have an 8 x 10 Arkay Speed Dodge contact printer. It has individually switchable Argon lamps. Some models had a built in timer. Range of the timer is from 0.1 to 9.9 seconds. Even printing Azo times are short 1 second to 3 seconds. What was this device used for? I have always assumed it was for making a boat load of 8x10s from a single negative. If a company needed single weight publicity or advertising 8x10 glossies this would have made short work of it.

I am also wondering if the UV rich source would have been used for studio proof print out paper?

It is a beautiful piece of equipment. Having said this I tend to use a dichro enlarger for light source with VC paper with a print frame for contact printing 8 x 10 negatives.

Has anyone had experience with this unit?

Best, Mike

I believe the platen on the Speed Dodge was 10 X 12 (Model AP-18IT).
Medical imaging, primarily Ophthalmology, utilized it for contact printing
negatives from angiography studies onto Litho sheet film and tray processing,
usually in diluted Dektol. Of course, one could contact print anything, producing
a positive transparency with exceptional tonal range. The film was, then, interpreted,
on a light box, viewed on an overhead or individual frames mounted in a slide mount and
projected onto a screen.

Thanks,
Martin

DOSOJOS said:

I believe the platen on the Speed Dodge was 10 X 12 (Model AP-18IT).
Medical imaging, primarily Ophthalmology, utilized it for contact printing
negatives from angiography studies onto Litho sheet film and tray processing,
usually in diluted Dektol. Of course, one could contact print anything, producing
a positive transparency with exceptional tonal range. The film was, then, interpreted,
on a light box, viewed on an overhead or individual frames mounted in a slide mount and
projected onto a screen.

Thanks,
Martin

Click to expand...

This is interesting there are a couple labels on the machine different exposure times for reflective and transparency. I use it occasionally for printing 8x10 negs on silver chloride Azo like paper if you were a proficient operator you could expose a sheet every 15 to 20 seconds. Thanks for the info.
Best Regards Mike