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Table-top material for enlargers bench

Neil Grant

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… it needs to go ontop of a tubular steel supporting frame work. Needs to carry a De Vere 504 and LPL 7700. I’m thinking of 18 or 24mm ply. Do You think this is ok?
thanks.
 
If you are going to use plywood, consider sandwiching two pieces, with the grain in each piece going different ways.
 
Yes - but when you want plywood to be load bearing, and in particular load bearing for something that can be quite heavy, it helps.
 
MattKing said:
Yes - but when you want plywood to be load bearing, and in particular load bearing for something that can be quite heavy, it helps.
Click to expand...
But turning the grain direction of the top veneer wouldn't really impact the load-bearing properties of the 2-sheet combination.
 
Get melamine. It's about as flat and as stable as you're likely to find. Use two layers if necessary.

Plywood is dimensionally stable but not known for being particularly flat. Melamine is also very easily cleaned.

Forming plywood or sign plywood is also a good choice. Those are engineered to be flat.
 
Marble. Find someone doing a renovation and volunteer to haul away some scrap
 
I'm using a solid core passage door, purchased used for $10. It's 36x70 inches and sits on a 2x4 lumber frame with storage shelves below. I have a Beseler 45MXT and Omega 4x5 ProLab with timers sitting on it.
 
24mm is far from enough. think 40 + and from generally available materials, kitchen countertop would work well. There is a special plywood for making concrete forms, waterproof, finished flat and it's coated.

For comparison Durst L1200 top is 50mm thick.

Plain plywood to me is a no go. It would require a lot of finishing to make it smooth and sealed at the same time. You could get furniture quality plywood which would make that preparation easier.
 
Bill Burk said:
Marble. Find someone doing a renovation and volunteer to haul away some scrap
Click to expand...

My inlaws have an 8ft slab of granite countertop leftover from a renovation, it's gonna be my darkroom counter just as soon as I can move all 350lbs of it
 
You could go nuts and get a piece of 1-1/8" subfloor plywood (it's typically a tongue and groove material), then adhere a piece of melamine material to that. My Saunders/LPL 4550 has a steel C channel stiffener under the center of its baseboard, there is always that strategy too.

"MDO" is the commonly available sheet good that can be used as concrete forms.
 
I had my local big-box store make a custom 10-foot by 40-inch kitchen countertop for my darkroom. This sits on a framework with "X" supports in the spaces between the walls and the two vertical support walls (which double as shelving walls). No problems with two Beseler 4x5 enlargers. As far as weight-bearing capacity of kitchen countertops, think about it; you likely wouldn't hesitate to stand on your kitchen countertops. As long as they are braced and supported well enough they should more than do the job. And, they are flat and come in whatever color you like My countertop is black marbley-looking melamine on top.

Best,

Doremus
 
I use laminated kitchen countertop. It has worked well for me. One theoretical advantage is that it shouldn’t transmit vibration as well as plywood.

For plywood, I’d use double-sided MDO (medium density overlay) which is waterproof plywood with a waterproof kraft paper surface. It’s flatter than most plywood, and impervious to water. You could paint it, or just leave it bare. A big advantage over particle board countertop is that you don’t need to finish the raw surfaces.
 
I got a kitchen countertop from IKEA, they tend to have non sold /liked colors for cheap.
 
Having something laminated with Formica is going to be a lot easier to keep clean than basic plywood or MDF, without having to sand and varnish it. Melamine coated MDF is an alternative, but needs to be cut with the right kind of blade, and then have the edges covered with some kind of moulding. Or see if a local kitchen countertop supplier has a leftover scrap at reasonable pricing.

For enlarging you want a very solid stable base support PLUS connection to the wall via bracing.
 
Ian Grant said:
I would go for kitchen top material, it is what I've always used in my darkrooms.

Ian
Click to expand...

I would also second that. That is what I used to support a 5" X 4" De Vere and Durst enlarger.
 
All my current enlargers are tall floor-mounted devices, with additional wall bracing (critical in this earthquake-prone area, but a good idea anyway in term of taming vibrations). In the past I've built custom cabinets for tabletop enlargers.

I could get all the laminated countertops I wanted for free from our company shop. A tiny blemish or ding, and they'd otherwise go to the dumpster. I have plenty of my own lamination equipment too. Same for doors; we sold a lot of especially solid ones to hospitals and the military; a slight mistake in manufacturing, and it got placed on the "free" stack for employees. I'm typing at the moment atop a varnished birch door supported by sawhorses, with a lot of overall weight on it, stuff piled up, including a napping cat.
 
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For heavy enlargers, it is best to look toward composite materials or pre-finished work surfaces. Ordinary plywood requires extensive sealing and sanding; otherwise, dust will become a perpetual problem. I personally installed a countertop made of high-density laminated MDF, basing my choice on information from 1StopBedrooms reviews regarding the reliability of the construction and materials. This solution appealed to me because the surface is perfectly flat and rigid. It does not flex under a load of several tens of kilograms—especially if the steel frame is properly constructed.

 

Looks like butcher block to me, unless that is a veneer.
 
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