Hypo Clear if Toning later??

[brian steinberger]

I printed a few prints tonight on MGIV FB and will tone them in another session at another time. Do I need to use hypo clear or just a long good wash? They are washing now with no hypo clear. I assume that is good enough? If I had time they would go into the selenium after the fix with no hypo clear anyway. So I wasn't sure it I needed a hypo clear before the final wash.

 

[NB23]

A good wash without hypo clear is just as archival as a good wash with it.

Many times I wonder about the effectiveness of hypo clear. Does it really work or is it merely a placebo? I sometimes wonder.

 

[brian steinberger]

Thanks, I completed an hour wash on the prints, with no hypo clear. When I tone them I will wet them, tone in selenium, then hypo clear, sepia, hypo clear again and final wash. I live by hypo clear, but that's how I was taught.

 

[Robert Hall]

Hypo clear decreases the time necessary to wash a print thoroughly. A print really should be washed well to avoid staining from toning.

Washing should be completed as soon as possible after fixing, within 24 hours, or the fix will not come out in the wash.

Some toners require refixing and a wash or at least a short wash after toning. It's best to consult with Tim's or Steve's books on toning procedures.

 

[RalphLambrecht]

it resally works.a good wash alone can't beat it and is not asgood.

 

[Ian Grant]

A good wash without hypo clear is just as archival as a good wash with it.

Many times I wonder about the effectiveness of hypo clear. Does it really work or is it merely a placebo? I sometimes wonder.

The effects of the sulphite in the hypo clear are to help make some of the semi-soluable silver/thiousulpte complexes soluable so that they can be washed out of the paper.

And yes it does work.

Ian

 

[skahde]

It depends on the toning. While selenium tolerates a bit of fixer left in the paper, gold and some other need thoroughly washed prints. In the latter case, HCA may save you time as has been discussed above.

 

[RalphLambrecht]

It depends on the toning. While selenium tolerates a bit of fixer left in the paper, gold and some other need thoroughly washed prints. In the latter case, HCA may save you time as has been discussed above.

xactly

 

[Ian Grant]

It depends on the toning. While selenium tolerates a bit of fixer left in the paper, gold and some other need thoroughly washed prints. In the latter case, HCA may save you time as has been discussed above.

It's not that KRST or equivalent Selenium toners like Ilfords tolerate fixer they actually contain it - Ammonium Thiosulphate and sulphites - anyway. However these toners will cause staing where there's been poor fixing with too high a silver content and it's still better to use hypo clear (or a plain sulphite solution) before drying and toning later.

If you're using a two bath fixer regime and the second bath is fresh and very low in silver content then that hypo clear sten is less important.

Ian

 

[Doremus Scudder]

Hypo-Clear after the selenium toning and before the final wash. You don't need it for an intermediate wash. You will have to wash thoroughly after the toning. I save my second fix for my toning sessions and don't hypo clear for the first wash (which comes after the first fix). Prints are then dried and collected for a toning session. They only sit a maximum of a couple of weeks before getting the second fix, toning and a thorough wash. No problems with degradation and the final prints pass residual silver and hypo tests with flying colors. I actually think the intermediate wash helps.

Best,

Doremus

www.DoremusScudder.com

 

[tkamiya]

If you are washing for a whole hour, that should be sufficient. What I understand from reading various instructions is that 30 minutes wash with HCA or 60 minutes without washes out sufficient amount of Fix from paper anyway.

My process is to HCA and wash for 30 minutes before toning. Then re-use the HCA for after toning or toning and re-fixing depending on what I am doing.

I, too, am not sure about the effectiveness of HCA especially when it aggressively absolves air during storage. How do I know it hasn't degraded unless I test every time? I did an unscientific test once. When I only washed for 5 minutes (FB paper), I saw some staining when toned. With 15 minutes or longer, no such staining. I figure 30 minutes is sufficient with half way working HCA. Very unscientific but that's what I do. After about a year with process like this, no staining has been noted.

 

[Doremus Scudder]

A wash aid is indispensable for getting well-washed prints. There are lots of threads on this and lots of charts/tests/explanations already that you can search for, so I won't bother going into that here. It is difficult to get really well-washed prints with modern papers without a wash aid

The oxidation of the sodium sulfite in the wash aid limits its lifespan. It won't do its job if it's oxidised. Working solutions go bad in a few hours. Stock solutions can go bad as well, but have longer lifespan . I mix my wash aid fresh for each session (1 Tbsp sodium sulfite plus a pinch of metabisulfite per liter) and make sure I don't exceed capacity (check the Kodak HCA package for capacity if you're not sure) in order to be assured of fresh solutions.

With powdered bulk chemicals, it is not recommended to mix smaller portions of the contents. However, HCA is almost completely sodium sulfite, so mixing smaller portions of this is less problematic. I have done this in the past with HCA and it seemed to work well. This is one possible solution to the aging problem if you don't want to mix one-shot from scratch.

There's no reason to use too-old, exhausted wash aid, however, so figure out a way to deal with the constraints some way. Mix one-shot from scratch like I do, or try to do enough prints to use up the stock solutions, or try mixing just bits of the HCA at a time, or just toss the stock when it gets too old and deal with the small financial loss. All are better than incompletely washed prints.

As I mentioned earlier, I give fix one and then wash my prints for an hour, dry them, and collect the keepers for a toning session. Toning sessions consist of a soak, fix 2, toner, wash aid, rinse, wash, and stabilizer. I can save up enough prints to use up quite a bit of wash aid in a couple of days this way. Maybe it could work for you as well. I try to keep the time after the first wash/dry and before toning to a minimum, but I imagine that you could go as long as a month or so without degradation as long as you wash a minimum of on hour the first time.

Hope this helps,

Doremus

www.DoremusScudder.com