Cabbage, anyone?

What About Bob

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This is probably going to sound really out there. For the last two development runs I have noticed that after dumping the stop and the fixer out from the tank I get this odor of what I can best describe as cabbage. The odor doesn't stay for long. These last two development runs I had switched from developing T-Max 100 to Catlabs 80 with my usual PQ universal process that I have been playing around with for about a month now.

Did I just create something new in my bathroom?
 

reddesert

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Cabbage's typical odor comes from sulfur in sulfide compounds. Fixer can sulfur out; your fixer may be reaching end of life.
 

koraks

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Some films can smell a little funky. Old Kodak color films would have a very strong phenolic smell for instance. Same with some old printing papers.

I wouldn't make too much of this, really.
 
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What About Bob

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reddesert said:
Cabbage's typical odor comes from sulfur in sulfide compounds. Fixer can sulfur out; your fixer may be reaching end of life.
Click to expand...

I just finished another clip test and emptied the fixer from the tank. The odor hit me, lol. Going to make a new batch.

I got something out from this that was positive. I finally have what looks like a neutral black tone, lol.
 

MattKing

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As I've taken in the last few months to making sauerkraut, I clicked on the thread title with interest and curiosity.
Sadly, I'm at least slightly disappointed .
Perhaps you have confused your bottles of fixer and kombucha?
 

F4U

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It has been my experience whether actually true or not, that "rapid fixer" sulfurs out more quickly than regular acid hardening fixer like Kodak Fixer. And even if it hasn't sulfured out noticeably, can exhibit all sorts of smells. And not always the common stinky rotten egg sulfur smell.
 
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What About Bob

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MattKing said:
As I've taken in the last few months to making sauerkraut, I clicked on the thread title with interest and curiosity.
Sadly, I'm at least slightly disappointed .
Perhaps you have confused your bottles of fixer and kombucha?
Click to expand...

After leaving the room I had a taste for kraut dogs with onions and mustard, lol. For now I will have to settle for dogs and beans.
 
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What About Bob

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I'm using Ilford Hypam. Five liter concentrate that was separated into individual one liter bottles. The new batch of working solution I made was fine. I will keep watch on the mix.
 
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What About Bob

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I bought brand new fixer. Multigrade instead of the Hypam this time around due to cost. I started using it last night. After going through the fixing step and dumping the tank out I was again greeted by the odor of cabbage. I did not notice this odor when mixing from the concentrate. This leads me to believe that something in my process might be causing this phenomenon.

Update: Throwing this out there: My stop bath was freshly mixed not long ago and is still yellow but when I measure it with pH strips what comes back is a color that indicates the pH being close to neutral?? That can't be right. I think the pH should hover somewhere around 4. Could the PQ formula be killing off the stop bath quicker even though the bath is still showing yellow and was freshly mixed thus not all of the developer is being neutralized? I do water rinses after the stop bath. I have been using PQ since 07/11/2025 and this cabbage odor just started a few weeks ago. I am trying process of elimination here.

The stop bath I use is by Sprint. The one with the perty vanilla scent.
 
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