Dupont 3159 Safety film

[juan]

I've found a roll of negatives shot on what the edge declares is Dupont 3159 Safety film. I'd like to guess the date, but can't seem to find any information on this film number. My old Photo Lab Index says that Dupont released a new polyester film "Cronar" in 1951. Is this the same film, or did Dupont make a safety film before 1951?
juan

 

[juan]

Seems no one knows any more than I do. I should have said the film is 35mm, I suppose. I'm going to go with early 50s. Several of the images have a pickup truck that matches photos of a 1937 Chevy. The truck is beaten up, dented fenders, spare held onto the side with a piece of wood. It looks just like the cars I remember that had been stretched beyond their useful life by the war.
juan

 

[PhotoJim]

Can you scan a piece of the negatives? I'm curious.

I'm afraid I don't go back far enough to know anything about DuPont's film products, except that they made some.

 

[PHOTOTONE]

Safety film is normally a name for tri-acetate film. Cronar is Duponts name for Polyester film, various manufacturers gave their polyester films names. Safety film (tri-acetate) is what all 35mm still film is still coated on.

IIRC, DuPont was more into making and marketing industrial films such as motion picture film stock, than consumer films.

 

[sun of sand]

Arrow pan seems to be the Dupont film I see on ebay most often
lower contrast high film speed 125 with greater red sensitivity
XF pan and ortho medium contrast 64 portrait/landscape
Medium resolving

Fine Grain pan 32 all around greatly enlarged film
Superior 2 available in 35mm 70mm
50 ASA and sharp

Seems like you have your Super Panchro Press/Tri-X/Panatomic/Super-X/Verichrome equivalents ..whichever they are

35mm seems more like Superior 2?

 

[rmolson]

I remember selling Dupont Superior 2 and 3 35mm 36 exposure back in the late 40's

 

[nworth]

I couldn't find anything about DuPont 3159 film, but I did remember that I had shot some DuPont film with a Cronar base in the 1960s. I found some of the negatives, and they are clearly edgemarked "DUPONT CRONAR SAFETY", but they have no other identification. I remember that this particular film was a 250 speed motion picture film. In the late 50s and 60s, DuPont's photo business was pretty well restricted to motion pictures and photomechanical products. What little information I have shows most products to be on the Cronar base at this time.

 

[juan]

Another update. In the same batch of old negatives are some made on Kodak Super XX - some marked as from Rochester and others marked made in England. It seems this family made a tour of Europe in the late 40s.

At any rate, the Kodak negatives are in far better shape than the Dupont. The Dupont negatives show reticulation that the Kodak do not. Some of the Dupont negatives have curled and wrinkled in all dimensions - the Kodak negatives are straight except for having been rolled up in a can for decades.

These negatives were stored in a box, rolled up in the old film cans. They seem to have originated in the town of Ohio, Illinois (USA). I found them in Macon, Georgia and they've lived with me in Florida for years. Not the best of film storage conditions.

 

[PHOTOTONE]

Before the modern tri-acetate, and polyester film bases (various trade names), there was a "safety" film that was less dimensionally stable. Don't know much else, but as far back as the late 1920's home movies and various non-theatrical films were produced on this "safety" film.