Distilled water -- finding it? Making your own?

RalphLambrecht

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Sirius Glass said:
Ditto. I have been using tap water in the Los Angeles area for developing black & white and color film and developing prints for over a decade without ever having a problem.
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nothing wrong with tap water; in many areas, tap water is tighter controlled than table water.
 

cliveh

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Deposits in tap water will not effect the film or development. The time to use distilled or de-ionised water is at the end of the process before drying.
 

chriscrawfordphoto

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Sal Santamaura said:
The Walmarts around here sell something that's labeled "for distilled water uses." In other words, not actually distilled water. How is yours labeled in IN Walmarts?
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I haven't bought any there in a long time; been buying at Kroger because there's a Koger very close to my house. When I bought distilled water at Walmart before, it just said "Distilled Water" on the label. I'll have to look next time I go there.
 

AgX

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chriscrawfordphoto said:
It just said "Distilled Water" on the label.
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Over here at shops one only finds bottles designated "Distilled Water". My current bottle bears, in small letters and kind of hidden, the remark "according to VDE 0510", a german electrical standard which content even in times of internet is not to find for free...
At the moment on the net seemingly all german made bottles designated "Distilled Water" bear the, typically small letter, remark "demineralized according to VDE 0510", or just "demineralized".
At least the designation at my bottle I consider legally misleading, in case it was not distilled.

I assume the only means to differenciate would be by the price.



Of course now one should ask what is the differcence between distilled and demineralized water, more as for sure distilled water has been demineralized in the literal meaning, and what effect a difference might have for darkroonm use.

Distilled versus demineralized water

Hello again! I have just found out that demineralized water is a lot cheaper than distilled water around here (Rio de Janeiro). My question is: can I replace distilled water with demineralized water when mixing my developer? Thanks a lot! Edimilson
www.photrio.com
 
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alanrockwood

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Inexpensive water distillers are pretty easy to find. My wife bought one, and we distill several batches per week to use for various uses. It's pretty easy to use, and distilled water produced this way is lot less expensive than buying distilled water from the store. Plus, distilled water has been scarce lately in the stores, as you noted.
 

Petrochemist

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Singly distilled water is not a pure enough grade for some of the kit we have in our lab. apparently at least triple distilled would be required! I believe demineralised water is typically a higher grade than singly distilled but might not reach the 18mega ohm conductance of truly pure water.

Our tap water is quite hard but is still drinking water (in fact distilled/demineralised water is not good to drink as it tends to wash minerals out of your body).
In Europe bottled drinking water is generally less highly regulated than tap water. In some cases it can be very high in minerals - the very bits you want to avoid for photographic use.

I ended up buying ion exchange cartridges for our lab use, but these would be overkill for photographic processing unless you are using huge amounts of water!
 

Ian Grant

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For my darkroom use, mixing chemistry from raw chemicals I use deionising water jug. I have to use one in the house as well as the kettle furs up quickly as the water here is so hard.

I use tap water for diluting chemistry, and even the final rinse with films and paper, no issues with drying marks here. However, when I'm in Turkey the final rinse is with drinking water, as the apartment's water supply has a very high mineral salt content, it's undrinkable.

Ian
 

VinceInMT

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chriscrawfordphoto said:
I haven't bought any there in a long time; been buying at Kroger because there's a Koger very close to my house. When I bought distilled water at Walmart before, it just said "Distilled Water" on the label. I'll have to look next time I go there.
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Walmart carries a brand of “Distilled Water” called “Parent’s Choice.” Looking at the very small label it states ingredients are “distilled water, magnesium sulfate, potassium bicarbonate, potassium chloride.” How do they get away labeling it “Distilled Water” when it has added minerals?

Their house brand doesn’t state added stuff.

Another thing to consider is that you might get free delivery from Walmart. My wife ordered a $4 package of red pens (accountant with tax season coming up) and specified a pickup. They were out of stock and shipped them via UPS. A big box, air bags, and 4 pens delivered to the house with no delivery charge. One wonders how that business model is profitable.
 

VinceInMT

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One thing you might look at is if your water supplier provides monthly test results of the water it supplies. Ours gets it water from the Yellowstone River and provides monthly reports like this one. They do vary over the year.

 

DREW WILEY

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Even here once in awhile, after major rainstorms, the tap water might become a little discolored or have tiny bits of visible mineral content. In those exceptional cases, I'll use bottled water even for mixing film developer, and attach an in-line filter to my print washer hose. Excellent mountain water comes across the State to large local reservoirs, surrounded by rangeland. Enough runoff from all that adjacent acreage, and it affects the overall city water. It's safely treated, yes, but not necessarily photographically ideal in those cases. The biggest risk is getting tiny bits of foreign matter embedded in soft print emulsion during washing.

Outside this area, the major water source is the rivers, where it's almost impossible to remove every trace of agricultural pesticide etc. Certain entire towns out there require water trucks bringing safe water in. And where downstream river water usage overlaps refinery fumes blowing upriver, that what's called "cancer alley". Those trace chemicals don't show up on routine utility reports, though they are monitored at a higher research level. One more reason not to move to the burbs. It's also about forty or fifty degree warmer out there on in the summer, downright hot. But maybe washing prints in that pesticide-laden river water would preserve them from booklice! There's an excess amount of selenium too, in some of water - one less toning step needed. And for those of you who want to be the Diane Arbus of wildlife photographers, you can find two-billed and three-eyed ducks due to mutagenic selenium concentrating in particularly infamous retaining ponds, like Kesterson Reservoir.
 
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eli griggs

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You can easily make a solar distillery from basic lumber, sheet metal and a basin of some sorts.

Basically you make a shallow basin or trough to hold the parent water, blacken copper would do or even do so without the copper being darkened, and a sheet of glass, a plain glass that lets through uv light, goes on top of the basin so the sun's heat of the day, raises the temperature to a degree that causes the water to evaporate and move the evaporated moisture a slanted board, part of a closed system collect on its plain glass covering where it forms droplets, that roll down the glass, past a smaller catch pan for splashed water from high winds, etc, to be allowed to accumulate in a deeper collection pan or sink, where the now distilled water is accumulated for filling jugs.

Minerals will remain in the upper reaches of the shallow top basin and will need purging on occasion and fresh water supplied.


That's the basic requirement for a passive solar distillery, however the principal is so simple there are many ways to achieve it and with a number of materials, though I'm partial to copper workings at this time, even though I'm buying, no making distilled water.
 

Disconnekt

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My local walmart has distilled water, 99cent store too
 

snusmumriken

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I am guilty of loosely bracketing distilled and de-ionised water together. I use the latter as a final rinse when developing negatives, because the very hard tap water here guarantees drying marks (on 35mm film). I only need 300ml per film, so it's not exactly extravagant. Here in the UK, de-ionised water is sold at petrol stations (for car windscreen washers) and in hardware stores for domestic irons, etc.

It's surprising how much genuinely distilled water you can harvest from a de-humidifier if you need to run one anyway, but I wouldn't run one specially to fuel my darkroom hobby.
 

eli griggs

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Walmart and my local Food Lyon grocery store, as well as others, plus 'drug stores' all carry distilled water, which I'm use to paying 79¢ US to $1.09 for, per gallon, which is why I'm no distilling my own, at this time, but since I use distilled water for all processes, including washing film and papers using "The Ilford Method" if I begin to have a much larger volume of developing tasks, I would start my own distilling just to save space in my small darkroom, where more than han a dozen gallons of distilled water jugs present a storage issue.

By the way, if you make a distilling rig, using copper tubing, joints, etc, silver braze the connections, no silver solder, which is no even close to brazed silver strength and is a danger.

Do no forget to include a pressure release fitting as well.
 

Sirius Glass

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Wow and some people complain that stop bath with indicator is just too damned expensive.
 

eli griggs

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Just as there are consumables, there are justifiable infrastructures/equipment to photography.

Making a small passive distillery rig, can mostly be done with salvaged copper, lumber and glass, leaving glues or silicone, paint, screws or nails as the main expendables you may have to pay retail for, however, if you have a "Re-store" such as "Homes for Habitat" in your area. you may find great deals on many new in box materials, such as I have, in power nailer nails, roofing and brad nails. Duck tape, paints, screws, etc, which flow through these stores on an almost weekly basis.

If some one won't or can no afford stopbath with indicator, white vinegar by the gallon is almost as inexpensive as distilled Walmart water, and you'll have enough to use it on a single processing job or session and throw away to make fresh.
 

cliveh

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As long as your tap water is neutral pH, the deposits wont make any difference, as long as you rinse in distilled water before drying.
 

halfaman

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That is a very useful tip. When I started checking it I realized how good my tap water was and stopped buying deionized water, not even for final rinse.
 

foc

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Of course, you could always try this homemade device that can produce a variety of distilled liquids.



 

DREW WILEY

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No doubt someone from the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, and Firearms is starting to monitor this site now. It was inevitable. But if your homemade hooch is strong enough, you can burn it for sake of water distillation - or just use it for the final film rinse itself.
 

Sal Santamaura

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Sal Santamaura said:
...I've had no problem finding actual distilled water (Arrowhead, labeled "prepared by steam distillation"). The change from pre-pandemic times is that it used to retail for $1.19 per gallon and now it's $2.99 per gallon...
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Update: as of yesterday, it's up again to $3.49 per gallon. I suspect locally skyrocketing fuel prices are driving this.
 
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