Extreme Enlarger Modifications

One of my projects for the winter was a slight modification of my Beseler 45 ( http://blog.rwhawkins.com/franken_beseler/ ) So far it has been working great. Anyone else have pictures of some enlarger DIY?

Fun.. Motorized focus? tough reach with your eye in a grain focuser.

Motorized focus is on my wishlist. For now a long rod with a ujoint mechanism to make a right angle.

I have a mint CB7 head I got for making a horizontal mural enlarger, has motorized focus. I plan to wire a remote to it so I can focus 50" prints....

Nice job! The high ceiling saves you back! I have to lower the baseboard of my 8x10 enlarger almost all the way down to get a 40" image.

Of course your post is incomplete...you have not shown us your clever solution to process the big prints

Hi-ya,

I had alot of fun with my Durst-Zilla modification. You might enjoyy reading about it at www.BlueGrassHarvest.com I attached a Beseler CB7 to a Durst L184 chassis. That enlarger is long gone, now I have a standard L184 and a DeVere 504. I still have the special mounting bar that interfaces the CB7 with the Durst. Your enlarger looks great - reminds me of a 10X10 Saltzman enlarger with all that steel tubing. Nice work !

Nothing this extreme for me. I hacked a 45M to mount the Zone VI 57 VC cold light head. Then found I really disliked that head.

Yes, I'll have to post about big print processing as well. I've tried the popular methods and settled on one that works well for me.

A significant project for me was modifying a 45S head to make exposures more consistent. I would delay anywhere from a spit second to several seconds.

It's been described on this site in more detail. To make a brief summary, I installed a Zone VI compensating enlarger timer sensor and use the timer to make exposures. I purchased the last Beseler adapter from Calumet for a Zone VI Type II enlarger. For some reason, Calumet made this adapter about two inches thick. As a result, the 45S was floating about an inch away form the negative. (No good.)

So, I had an excellent, local, metal craftsman Cut it down to about 1 1/8" , the same as what they made for the Type I enlarger. It works great.

Doesn't the 45VXL enlarger have motorized focus? I seem to think so. Maybe something from that can be adapted....