How do i drive my enlarger??

P

puggie

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Name
Bill
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I have picked up a pile of darkroom gear from MatBin (thankyou very much) which included a slightly sorry for it's self Durst F60 enlarger. I have stripped down the mechanical bits and cleaned/greased them up and the focus now works smoothly and as accurately as a simple system like it can.

I have no instructions for it, I've managed to get a 35mm neg in the holder and focus a nice sharp image on the baseboard. is there anything else to this? I have 50mm and 80mm lenses, 2 colminators(sp) I understand they 2 colminators are for the respective lenses or neg sizes (I takes both 35mm and 60X60mm).

Can anyone offer any advice or a good online guide for using this stuff. I have ordered some Ilford paper and some chemicals for making prints, but if anyone has any old useable paper knocking about I have an ad in the wanted section ;) Also can I make (successful) B&W prints from colour negs?
 
You should be able to make B&W pictures from colour negs though due to the mask of the neg they often have to have alot of contrast to get them looking good.
 
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cut your paper into strips for practising (y)
 
Ooops, no...

I read their developing one though :)

will have a read.
 
You'll need a decent timer so you can repeat any tests you make (using the test print maker, the fingery thing :) )
You'll need to stop the lens down manually a couple of stops after adjusting focus (the bigger lens is better for this as it has an illuminated f stop indicator, use the spacers to get the indicator wher you can see it - they are in the lens case with the lens) you may need to remove the plastic lens carrier as the beigger lens has a bigger throat. Bigger as in physical size - Companon I think it was, use that in preference to the Durst lens (on 35mm).
Thermometer to keep consistent processing temps.
Try and get hold of multigrade resin coated paper (if it still exists) and use the filters that came with the box of stuff to adjust your contrast to suit.
Make some dodgers and burners. Make sure the darkroom is lightsafe. Get a red safelight.

Cant think of anything else just yet, it was a few years ago.

Matt
 
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