Gas in the Bottle

I was reading back over Covington's article on HC-110 and he made the statement...

"On opening a 16-ounce or 500-mL bottle of HC-110, I decant the syrup into four amber glass medicine bottles, three of which are filled to the brim to exclude all air. I withdraw the syrup with an oral medicine syringe (designed for giving liquid medicines to babies; not used with needles and not restricted by law anywhere). Then I spray "Dust-Off" gas into the bottle to displace the air that was let in."

What does he mean by Dust-Off gas? I know what Dust-Off is but wasn't sure how he accomplished it other than turn the can upside down.

http://www.covingtoninnovations.com/hc110/

Dust-Off comes with a long, straw-like extension to the nozzle.

And it is slightly heavier than air.

So the Dust-Off can can be beside the glass bottles, with just a tiny bit of tilt so the extension goes into the entrance to the bottle.

I'm not sure that it matters though, as it is the moisture in the air that matters, and that seems to soon reach an equilibrium in a closed bottle.

I just leave HC-110 in the original bottle. It has remained viable for really long times, even when less than half filled.

The longest I ever kept any quantity of HC-110(Rodinal for that matter) was around a year and was curious. I have brown spots inside my current factory container of HC-110 and it started me to thinking about this-not the liquid itself but spots close to the top inside edges.

ColColt said:

The longest I ever kept any quantity of HC-110(Rodinal for that matter) was around a year and was curious. I have brown spots inside my current factory container of HC-110 and it started me to thinking about this-not the liquid itself but spots close to the top inside edges.

Click to expand...

For HC-110, those brown bits are just badges of experience.

The crystallized brown stuff probably won't develop film, but the remaining liquid seems to work fine - for years!

Maybe it will outlast me at only 6-10ml per roll.:joyful:

I use wine preserver in a can.

Putting a gas into the bottle to displace any air is really is a bit of overkill. Consider a half filled bottle of HC-110. One mole of oxygen gas occupies 22.4 l at STP. However air is only 19% oxygen so we are talking about 118 liters of air. So the amount of oxygen in the bottle is very small. The replacement gas probably costs more than the amount of HC-110 lost to oxidation.

The method of mixing developers and the method of decanting them into storage is key. Minimal turbulence. That air on top like Gerald says is tiny compared to the O2 that is introduced by turbulence.

The cheapest way for employing small amounts of inert gas to bottles with chemicals is using fluid lighter gas.

Of course you must be aware that you introduce a small risk of fire incident.

Way back when I first started using HC-110 and Rodinal I was paranoid about oxidation. I started transferring the liquid when the bottle got down close to half full to another smaller bottle and put marbles inside if needed to bring the level close to the top. Did it do any good? I don't know but, made me feel better anyway.