Gold toner (rotten?)

[Marco Gilardetti]

Hi there. I've tried some contact prints on print-out paper last weekend and something sure wasn't going ahead as it did the time before. I suspect the gold toner. Pictures came out horrible to say the least - one of these days in which you think that perhaps you should quit photography altogether.

Well, back in topic, the gold toner has a lot of a white precipitate in it, almost like snow flakes. Plus, it has coated the inner side of the glass bottle with a layer which is white toward the bottom and black at the top of the bottle.

To be honest, the gold toner arrived to me already with a lot of white precipitate in it when I first bought it from Moersch Chemie. It didn't look good at all, but since it was "new", I thought it was its usual look. Is it or not?

And what to do now? Is it worth trying to refill it with the gold chloride add-on the toner came with? Or would it mean wasting the refill compound? Should I better save it for my next order?

The funny thing is that Moersch advertizes its gold toner as being "worth its high cost as it has a very long shelf life". Perhaps I simply have a different concept of "long shelf life", as the cost was high for sure...

Thanks for any help - M.

 

[Ian Grant]

I would contact Moersch. Don't add mre Gold Chloride.

I make up my own Gold toners and have found they keep reasonably well, but can plate out over time.

Ian