Thought I'd update this thread for those interested. Firstly I managed to give the enlarger a good clean and it came up pretty well considering its age. These things really are built like tanks. The dichro filters were a bit of pest to get at but they cleaned up fine with a good rinse and wash in soapy water. It's amazing how much dust and flecks of paint (or some other foreign matter) was in the head so it's not surprising some ended up on the filters. Only my 39mm lensboard has shown and I can confirm that it doesn't work well with the 50mm Schneider lens. It's fine up to about 5"x7" prints but even then the bellows are fairly compressed and it doesn't hold focus very well due to the pressure. The 80mm lens with the head at the top of the column can do 8"x10" from 35mm negatives. I wish the postal service would get their act together so I can get onto some 4x5 printing - the lapla50 lensboard was ordered from B&H over a month ago and is still a noshow so I'm starting to get a bit anxious. I made some glassless carriers from 2mm aluminium sheet and brass rod for various film sizes. These replace the glass in the carrier although I still haven't used them as I haven't been able to find any black sprayable paint which works to my liking. Some 'Flat Gloss' paint (interesting description if ever I saw one) I tried wouldn't spray properly and the matt black from the local hobbyshop doesn't stick at all well to polished aluminium. At least whilst I'm waiting for the lensboard I had a chance to build an electronic colour analyser and timer - much nicer than my old timer which didn't always give you the same time for each push of the button.

Regards,