Salthill equipment

Hello all!


I’m posting this forum as I have the opportunity to get a film washer and dryer unit and want to know if it would be worth it?

I’m a side note I’ve looked through an old salthill catalogue and was wondering if anyone can post any photos of their salthill equipment?

It seems like their equipment is fairly nice and as an aspiring younger photographer, I’m building my arsenal currently. I’m also very interested in photos of the enlarger as it looks to be a very unique setup.

Thank you all and let me know your thoughts!

I remember drooling over their equipment back when you could buy it new, but prices were well beyond my budget. Therefore, I never owned any piece, but I don't recall any strong negative comments or reviews.

Same, I was happy with a Besler found in the trash. I'm reminded of the time I just has to have some B&O stereo components and that Nakamichi tape deck, this was just at the start of eBay, and I got good deals on all this equipment I couldn't really ever afford, but used was reasonable. Nothing lasted more than a year and nothing was fixable unless I knew someone good with circuit boards, lol, learned a lesson about high end electronics. I'm glad print washers have none. Edit: Prices for slot washers seem out of proportion to what they actually accomplish.

Like Alan, I too drooled over their offerings, particularly their 4x5 enlarger....but way out of my budget. I never once heard anything negative said about their products, either.

I have a Salthill 16x20 easel. It’s very heavy and very well made. I cannot speak for other Salthill equipment, but the easel was worth the money.

I made all of my own slot washers myself, up to 20x24 inch capacity. It's not hard to do if you have basic skills in acrylic fabrication. It took me an afternoon apiece. But Salthill offered one of the better commercial washers for that era. I have one of their enlarger orientation mirror devices. Their enlargers themselves are rare, unique, and involved a large bundle of fiber optics to evenly distribute the light, and were quite expensive, but really not very versatile for that kind of price point.

I’m hoping one day to own the enlarger for specifically 4x5 enlarging along with an easel from them.

I’m lucky enough to “daily drive” an lpl 4500 which I use for just about everything and have a “modified” light box for 6x7 as well as the normal 4x5 light box for it along with all three head units. I’m lucky with what I have and also am lucky I have time to wait for one to pop up eventually.

Keith Pitman said:

I have a Salthill 16x20 easel. It’s very heavy and very well made. I cannot speak for other Salthill equipment, but the easel was worth the money.

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I hear their easels are the best! Definitely want to pick up a 16x20 or 20x24 from them eventually.

Saganich said:

Same, I was happy with a Besler found in the trash. I'm reminded of the time I just has to have some B&O stereo components and that Nakamichi tape deck, this was just at the start of eBay, and I got good deals on all this equipment I couldn't really ever afford, but used was reasonable. Nothing lasted more than a year and nothing was fixable unless I knew someone good with circuit boards, lol, learned a lesson about high end electronics. I'm glad print washers have none. Edit: Prices for slot washers seem out of proportion to what they actually accomplish.

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I started with a beseler 23c which I had for about half a year learning on until I was super fortunate to find someone practically giving away an lpl 4500. After picking that up as well as finding a few auctions here and there for other heads for it, that’s my current setup.

At some point I want to delve into pin registration on 4x5 as well as the dream of having a salthill enlarger specifically geared for 4x5. It will all come in time!

Forget Salthill. Find a clean Durst 138 system if you are interested in pin registration precision.

I did some development work with Joe during the early Salthill days. He had a great vision and understood quality design. That said, there are many other enlargers (Think Durst 1200) that will perform better and allow for support and spare parts availability. The use of fiber optic transmission lines was a fun concept but I'm afraid those components are very, very out of date at this point.

Salthill was a one-man operation, which built very high quality equipment. Their products usually had some trick feature to set them apart, such as a fiber optic transmission assembly between light source and negative carrier in their 4x5 enlarger. However, the retail price tags were nose-bleed high as well, so sales were insufficient to keep the company alive for longer than its four or five years of existence. I bought their enlarger alignment tool, only to discover that it was too large to use on my medium format Durst enlarger. I still have it new in the box somewhere. Today, I'd avoid the more techy items which might require odd parts or unavailable schematics to service. However, a film washer and print dryer is pretty low tech stuff and should be safe and well worth buying if the price is right.

I purchased their safelight, it was a flatscreen. Worked well for about 3 years then died, by that time the company had folded.