# Englarger Problem (maybe)



## darin3200 (Jun 11, 2005)

I was making some prints the other day using the same techniques as always, I went and put an exposed sheet of Ilford RC in my developer and the print came out severly underexposed. I tried with another sheet, this time frying it at f/3.5 for about 20 seconds and the sheet came out still slightly underexposed. 
I was busy then, so I went back to the darkroom today and made a new batch of developer. Same results as last time after 1.5 minutes in the developer. With the underexposed print still in developer I turned on a large lamp and the paper immediately turned black. So that makes me think it isn't a chemical or paper problem but something with my enlarger. 

Any help is appreciated


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## Christie Photo (Jun 11, 2005)

Well....  could be simply that you have a very dense (overexposed) negative.

Has anything fallen into the enlarger... between the negative carrier and the lens?  Did you double-check the aperature of the lens?  Are you using a condenser enlarger?  Are you printing from the same size negative?  Whew!

We figure this one out.


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## KevinR (Jun 12, 2005)

Knowing that your using a 23c. I would say that as stated above, it might be a dense negative. I was printing an overexposed neg that took 1min 30sec and then some burn in to get it right. 

Some other options:
Need a new bulb. Fairly cheap fix if thats the problem.

Voltage. This is a long shot. If this is plugged into a circuit that has some big appliances, and there running, that could through voltage off some.

I would start at printing something that you have printed before and see what happens.


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## darin3200 (Jun 12, 2005)

Yeah, it was the negative. I was using an older negative of C-41 black and white kodak which is much more opaque than the Kodak T-Max. I ended up doing about a 45 second exposure instead of 5 seconds.


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