Enlarger bellows flare

Rigged up my 'new' Devere 504 enlarger tonight after some prelim maintenance.

I placed a neg in the 5x4 holder and projected onto the baseboard and noticed a series of fient but noticable concentric square rings around the image. Further investigation determined that it was flare from the bellows. Is this normal. I have used an LPL enlarger but did not notice this problem.

Would it be worth painting the inside of the bellows or what else can you recommend.

Phill

You might put a 45 neg holder in the enlarger and see if the rings are still there. Of course, the blacker the better inside your enlarger. I don't know about paint on bellows. Black baffles made of thin shim stock is something telescope makers use to reduce stray light. I don't know where they would go in a Devere, as I don't know these enlargers.

Loose Gravel said:

You might put a 45 neg holder in the enlarger and see if the rings are still there. Of course, the blacker the better inside your enlarger. I don't know about paint on bellows. Black baffles made of thin shim stock is something telescope makers use to reduce stray light. I don't know where they would go in a Devere, as I don't know these enlargers.

Click to expand...

LG

The rings are clearly evident with the 5x4 holder in place.
I vacuumed the inside of the bellows this morning (very dusty) and cleaned all internal surfaces and will experiment again tonight.

Phill

Phill,

I am not sure if your enlarger is a condensor or diffusion light source enlarger. However this sounds like my Durst when the lamp is not properly adjusted to the condensors.

If you have a diffusion source, then I would plan on everything internal to the light path needing to be a flat black.