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ADOX XT-3 (beautiful) "sparkles" in solution

Denis OLIVIER said:
Hi everyone

Happy to give you a good update about this.

I changed water supplying, from demineralized "common" water in supermarket to distilled one I do now with a water distiller machine, and it is perfect.
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We are very happy to see that the change of water quality has solved the problem for you completely .
And good to see that you and we had the same idea independently from each other .

Denis OLIVIER said:
I really deeply appreciate @ADOX Fotoimpex effort to communicate with end users and all guys who give their input here.

Take care and have a nice week-end.
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It has been a pleasure for us. We highly appreciate your motivation and your approach concerning that topic, and your artistic photographic work in general. We're looking forward to see your next photos.

ADOX - Innovation in Analog Photography.
THE BEST THINGS IN LIFE ARE ANALOG.
 
Denis OLIVIER said:
I changed water supplying, from demineralized "common" water in supermarket to distilled one I do now with a water distiller machine, and it is perfect.
Click to expand...
Next would be the double-distilled lab grade demineralized water?
I'm not mad at you, let's be clear, it's just the fact that a powder developer should be formulated and manufactured to work flawlessly with common tap water in mind.
 
Alessandro Serrao said:
Next would be the double-distilled lab grade demineralized water?
I'm not mad at you, let's be clear, it's just the fact that a powder developer should be formulated and manufactured to work flawlessly with common tap water in mind.
Click to expand...

XT-3 is certainly formulated regarding usage of tap water. Meanwhile probably thousands of customers are using it with tap water, and without problems. My results with tap water have also been without problems.
That one customer had problems with a certain type of demineralized water (who knows whether the process were done properly at that facility) does not make the product a bad product.
At the end, the problem was solved. That is what counts.
 

I do agree about the water item, but I can't accept that the problem could be XT-3.

It is strange that the quality of one demineralised water producer can cause that kind op problem: a pre-packed powder developer not to solve properly.

It is rather strange too that distilled water, and not tap- nor demineralised water, must be used by OP to mix XT-3.

Knowing that XT-3 is particularly formulated to solve fast, safely and thoroughly in tap water.

To my personal opinion, the problem isn't fully solved, although not in the environmental way: shouldn't tap water be clean, pure, healthy and 'safe to be drunk'?
 
Philippe-Georges said:
shouldn't tap water be clean, pure, healthy and 'safe to be drunk'?
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Depends. In any case, the requirements on drinking water in terms of human safety are entirely different from the requirements on clean process water for a variety of chemical or industrial processes.
For instance, your tap water may be very rich in calcium and iron salts, and it'll be perfectly safe to drink, but it may create very big problems with esp. ascorbate-based developers. It's an apples & oranges situation.

Btw, as far as I can tell, the 'problem' here may still be more of an aesthetic issue. The glass of water may or may not have small crystals in it - it sure does seem to be half empty and a hefty storm is brewing in it, too.
 

Exactly. And the quality of tap water differs massively from region to region. I once lived in a region where the tap water had a very high content of iron. And there I had problems with certain developers which worked flawlessly before when I lived in a region with tap water without that high iron content.

As to XT-3: So far no problems at all when I used it.
 
Yesterday I discovered what looks like this very same problem in my C41 CD, (Fuji Hunt Environeg LR). Mixed the same way I always do with tap water, and I really doubt this is the cause. Only 5 out of the 13 liters mixed have this problem. I store it as working solution in 2,5 liters amber glass bottles, two of them made out of borosilicate glass and another two are standard glass. The problem is present in the latter.

I will open a separate thread when possible.
 
halfaman said:
this very same problem in my C41 CD, (Fuji Hunt Environeg LR)
Click to expand...

I observed something vaguely similar when I last mixed this developer, but I mixed it with half the amount of water that's prescribed in order to save space. It seems to work, except that some of the bottles formed very long, fine crystal needles. They dissolve upon mixing with the required additional water and warming to process temperature. I store my chemistry in regular glass btw.
 

In my case I mixed to the normal working dilution, starter included, and the crystals did not dissolved when warming at 38° C. It is curious also that only half of the bottles are affected. I will try again to disolve them warming and stirring more aggresively, the last time I just put 250 ml solution in the Jobo tempered bath and check after a while.
 

Hi Denis,

I know it's been a while since your original post & updates, but I've been having the exact same problem that you described with various batches of XT-3 and was wondering - does the solution you found with the distilled water still work well?

Thanks in advance!
 

Currently I don't pay too much attention to it.
I think it occurred when I was dispatching solution in small 250 ml bottles only.
Since 1 year I finally save it in a 1 liter dedicated plastic bottle.
For sure I use mainly real distilled (not demineralized) water and still use magnetic agitation with success.

Another point is that I always filter it now. And when I had these "crystals", this was the only way to remove them, as the XT-3 developer was working well anyway.
 

Thanks for replying, Denis!
So it seems like it's not an absolutely clear answer on what worked for you, but it was one of those steps or a combination.
The problem I had was that the little sparkles/needles/crystals - when not filtered through pantyhose - actually left permanent marks on the negatives.. and that's not a risk I want to take...
I will also try in different steps - using different bottles (I also use brown glass now), using distilled water (I use tap water), and using warmer water (I mix at around 24c) and longer dissolving time (which you mentioned that didn't help for you, but still... worth a try as a last option ).
 

Welcome, and yes this is still not clear for me.
Filtering just before dilution avoided the problem and I admit I didn't pay attention to it after mixing 25+ 1L XT-3 packages.
For those who want to know, I used as filters first basic coffee ones, then finally switch to qualitative Whatman GRADE 113V cellulose filters.
 
I'm always concerned about filtering not yet used photo-chemicals in order to remove floating bits.
The concern relates to removing those bits - which may very well be desirable constituent components of the chemical - at least once they are dissolved.
 

Yeah, best would be to resolve this in the process and avoid needing the filtering. Once the sparkles are there it's kind of a no-win situation.. I've had specks on the negatives due to them. It seems to work for Denis with filtering, though. I am still determined to try out the other three options one after the other to find the cause - other bottles, distilled water & higher mixing temperature + longer dissolving time. Let's see how that goes.
 

Thanks, we are always interested in what you will find on your side, keep us informed
 
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