Devere 8x10 help

[Andrew_3677]

Hi..hoping that someone has experience with a Devere 8x10 Vertical enlarger..its has the 108 Dichromat head (8 x 250W halogens).

I recently was perhaps crazy enough to bring this beast into my darkroom. I got it from a big print operation that had gone to lambda's etc so they wanted the devere out of there. It was in good condition and working fine, and I personally saw it in operation. It was carefully disassembled and transported back to my house. It has been re-assembled and an electrician helped me hook up a 30A 250 volt circuit for it.

Power seems to be running fine to the enlarger. blower is blowing, hand controls are moving the motorized stages up and down the column. But the lightsource is issuing a high pitched tone when the focus switch is turned on. Power seems to be getting to the head as the filtration dials are illuminated.

From the manual i have, in the troubleshooting section, it says the high-pitched tone indicates a lamp is blown. So i used an ohmmeter to check each bulb and they all seem to be OK. I do have a set of replacement bulbs, but as the current set are all looking ok on the meter, does it make sense to swap them out? seems like something else is going on and triggering the warning alarm?

If anyone has experience with this enlarger is there anything that i should be looking at?

thanks -andrew

[Ralph Barker]

I don't have a Devere, Andrew, but you might also want to put your voltmeter on the lamp circuit, too, to determine the power is reaching the sockets OK. An "open" somewhere in the circuit would behave just like a burnt-out bulb.

[wfwhitaker]

Andrew,



Have you checked to make sure that all the bulbs are actually illuminating? I've not used a vertical DeVere, but did have a horizontal DeVere 8x10 enlarger. That one required a "shorting plug" to bypass the safety interlock and allow you to operate the dichroic head with the cover off and determine which bulbs were not operating once the alarm indicated a problem. Yours may or may not require such, but you really need to be able to see if all the bulbs are lighting in spite of your ohmmeter's readings.



My experience was that there is very little DeVere support in the US. Odyssey Sales (http://www.odyssey-sales.com) in the UK does provide DeVere support and they can tell you who their agent is in the US (or wherever you live).



If the enlarger was working normally when you first saw it, chances are it's a simple repair.



Best,
Will

[Nick_3536]

http://www.khbphotografix.com/

Is a Canadian firm that fixes Devere. I'm fairly sure they deal with people south of the border. They list US $ prices.

[Andrew_3677]

Thanks for the replies...i went back and checked the lamp holders with my meter..they checked out good too..then when i went and tried it again..voila! working enlarger..must of been a loose contact. Thanks again for the advice.

best -andrew

[JanE]

I have the same beast standing in my darkroom. Before it was possible to get it in, the ceiling had to be raised. But of all vertical enlargers, I beleieve it's still the finest one.

I changed all lampholders to the newer flat and thinner models, as there was always contact problems with the bulky cheramic ones. After this there's more seldom lamp burnings, but it still happens. Observe that the lamps are connected two in one circuit; as one burns, the other will have higher voltage. Before I discovered this I burned once five lamps on one day.

That's the reason for the terrible buzzer to wheep. Once you hear it begin, turn off the light immediatly. Then take down the head, place yourself on a chair or something, open both dark slides that covers the lamps, put light on for a moment to recognice which lamp is dead and replace it.

I'm suffering with another problem; the filters are now jammed, or better said they will not move until you hit or bang the head violently. The filter holders or small sliders are a little rusty and seems to need some grease? Anyone having some advice to this?

Jan, Finland.

[Andrew_3677]

hi jan..yeah, devere went overboard with the alarm..its loud!

i have the plastic white holders for the lamps and i have the beast working now..but it has a few idiosyncracies..when i first turn the focus light on, the alarm sounds, i turn it off and the blower, wait a few seconds..turn the blower and focus switch back on and everything is ok..this happens everytime. i also noticed that my hand controls for raising and lowering the lamp and lens stages are quite sensitive..its easy to overshoot sharp focus. I think the springs in the hand controls that are meant to bring the control back to neutral when u release probably need to be replaced.

My filter dials are working fine..the pull down lever that brings the filters into the light path is a little stiff tho.

it is an impressive beast tho..my friends think it looks like something out of a hospital x-ray ward.

regards -andrew