Ilford 500 System

[Raven Garrow]

I just saw a Beseler 45MXT enlarger advertized on an auction. The light source i s the "Ilford 500 System". Does anyone have any knowlege of this system? Pros - cons.

[Trevor Crone]

Raven I use a Multigrade 500 head which comes with power supply and keypad to set time and paper grade. The head uses two lamps a green and a blue which are either used singularly or in combination to set the grade. The green is of course soft and the blue hard. In use you simply key-in the required grade and exposure time on the keypad and the head does the rest it's as easy as falling off a log! The only downside that I have encountered so far is the thermal cut- out is rather sensitive on my head so if you take a long time to compose the image on the baseboard and keep switching on the head it overheats and cuts out and you have to wait for it to cool down before you can activate it again. Regards,

[fred_1006]

I have used the Ilford 500 in commercial situations for many years and think it's great. One often overlooked feature of this system is the ease with which you can burn in a negative at a different contrast grade than your base exposure, assuming you are using a multi-grade paper,which everyone seems to be going to even in fiber base materials.

fred

[scambug]

I've been using the Ilford 500 system for the last few weeks at the Print Space rental darkroom in New York City, and can say that I much prefer it to the Saunders I'm used to. I've been enlarging 6x6 to 20"x24" and I'm very impressed. The lights seem much stronger than Saunders, which reduces exposure times, and the pictures seem crisp. I've also been using a Rodenstock lens, which seems better than the Nikkors I use with the Saunders.

[Jeff Scott]

"Labwork" in Cleveland, Ohio has three of these heads on their enlargers. We have been using these for over a decade with great results. They are reliable and after using one of these you will never go back to individual filters under the lens!