Building a BW darkroom, looking for an enlarger. The old Beseler 23's seem rater attractive because of their robust condition. So I stumbled upon this
specimen and I wonder if something is missing? I mean, normally between the filter compartment and the upper bellows goes a "condenser housing", but with color head there's no need for condenser, right? But why is the bellows disconnected? Pictures from internet show it assembled both with and without condenser, which is conusing:
I will contact the seller of course, but he inherited this and may not know much.
Optics, negative carriers don't bother me much as they could be bought and shipped. But the main frame I have to pick up, shipping would be a killer.
Beseler is not the only option of course. For ex. I am also looking at the Philips PCS 2000 offer. However for indexing I am considering attaching a digital camera, as it was done in
this post, so the solid heavy construction is a plus.
So, is this a hard pass, or worth looking at?