HOW TO: DIY Besalign lens board

This came up in another discussion here this week; some enlargers have little or no alignment control at the lens stage - a "Besalign" board is just the thing - if you can find one.

Here's a PDF of my take on making one yourself (PDF). Doesn't take mad engineering skills, the parts are cheap, but a drill press is pretty handy. Or take it to your favorite fabricator-type shop.

Feel free to distribute or post, or send me corrections.

M Carter said:

This came up in another discussion here this week; some enlargers have little or no alignment control at the lens stage - a "Besalign" board is just the thing - if you can find one.

Here's a PDF of my take on making one yourself (PDF). Doesn't take mad engineering skills, the parts are cheap, but a drill press is pretty handy. Or take it to your favorite fabricator-type shop.

Feel free to distribute or post, or send me corrections.

Click to expand...

Thanks!

Yes, thank you! I have a terrible time keeping the lens stage on my 45MX even marginally aligned so might just try this if I can get access to a drill press.

artcarbuncle said:

Yes, thank you! I have a terrible time keeping the lens stage on my 45MX even marginally aligned so might just try this if I can get access to a drill press.

Click to expand...

I have an MXT and the film-plane upgrade (MX-T vs. MX) is pretty useless for alignment. An adjustable board and that kickass Versalign, and boom, tight focus. For lith prints with long exposures, I enlarge wide open all the time, even at large sizes, no softness issues.

For the drill press, try Harbor Freight - get on their web site and sign up for emails, they have sales every weekend. (If there's one close to you, it's a handy place and their quality goes up every year). My press was from them and going strong for years, it's currently $67. And they have lots of stuff for photo-uses, a-clamps in all sizes, ext. cords, tape, and so on.

Good tip!

BTW, any Versalign or laser-alignment users out there - get a cheap screw-on UV filter for your enlarging lens threads. Tape a dot of white paper to the center of the inner glass surface. Screw it on your lens when you do the lens stage step. Way way easier than the rubber-bands-and-glass-slide solution that comes with the Versalign. i store the filter in the Versalign box.

M Carter said:

BTW, any Versalign or laser-alignment users out there - get a cheap screw-on UV filter for your enlarging lens threads. Tape a dot of white paper to the center of the inner glass surface. Screw it on your lens when you do the lens stage step. Way way easier than the rubber-bands-and-glass-slide solution that comes with the Versalign. i store the filter in the Versalign box.

Click to expand...

I just did this based on the suggestion..you are right...that rubber band thing sucks and this works great!

Funny, in over 50 years of printing I have never found it necessary to align an enlarger. I guess I must be lucky.

Eric Rose said:

Funny, in over 50 years of printing I have never found it necessary to align an enlarger. I guess I must be lucky.

Click to expand...

Lucky

OR
the enlargers you've used couldn't be adjusted so far off to notice bad results

OR

You just don't notice things that others do

OR

A combination of all of the above.

I can say that on my enlarger, it can swing the lens stage and/or the negative stage sideways a LOT and if it gets bumped more than a couple of degrees off of vertical, then you can visibly see the out of focus areas and you cannot focus the entire negative.

Years ago I didn't know I could align an enlarger (or how to)-- I assumed it was set correctly at the factory and that was that. My prints looked fine.

I love being able to quickly and accurately check and adjust enlarger alignment with my laser alignment tool. My prints look fine!

I do like to take as many variables out of the equation as possible-- it's just one more assurance of accuracy and repeatability for me.

M Carter said:

BTW, any Versalign or laser-alignment users out there - get a cheap screw-on UV filter for your enlarging lens threads. Tape a dot of white paper to the center of the inner glass surface. Screw it on your lens when you do the lens stage step. Way way easier than the rubber-bands-and-glass-slide solution that comes with the Versalign. i store the filter in the Versalign box.

Click to expand...

Thanks! I made a DIY laser alignment tool out of a laser gun sight, a CD-R Spindle (to hold the sight upright), and a mirror. The whole setup cost me less than $10. I figured out how to do the everything but the lens board. This was the final step I was looking for!

Eric Rose said:

Funny, in over 50 years of printing I have never found it necessary to align an enlarger. I guess I must be lucky.

Click to expand...

I suppose so. I've owned a Beseler 67C, and now an MXT. They're just fine for 8x10, maybe even 11x14. When I get to 16x20, soft corners if I don't align them. I know there are some high-end enlargers that are rock-solid, never owned one. I've gone to 30" on the 67C and no issues once i got it aligned - not bad for a mid-level machine. I did have to brace the top of the column to the ceiling though.

I've made plenty of 16x20 prints with no issues. On top of that I'm totally anal about delivering a quality product so being oblivious to crappy prints is not likely. I'll go with the being lucky option

OP - It's no big deal, but the proper name for the laser device is VersaLab Parallel, rather than Versalign.
Also it's worth mentioning a caution here that some enlargers, like my Omega 5x7 tall column, have the sloping column design, and if not made very stiff can cause alignment to change as the head is raised; as a structural engineer I envision this behavior as a cantilever beam (the column) with a "nose-down" pitching force applied at its tip, and as the length of the beam increases (i.e., head is raised) the magnitude of the pitching force on the base connection increases and the rotation of its tip also increases (i.e., negative stage rotates). So if the column is vertical, the pitching force is unchanged, but the increased length of the column will still cause a smaller tip rotation. Top of the line enlargers, such as Durst, have vertical columns that are very stout and should be less afflicted. It's a matter of flexibility of the stressed components of the enlarger, not their strength. This is why Beseler incorporates bracing of its "columns" and is the benefit of wall mounts. Hope all this makes sense; illustrations would help if I knew how to do that easily.