Ilford Hypam Fixer

[Elvis]

Anyone tried Ilford Hypam Fixer? Any difference between regular Ilford Rapid Fixer?

Thanks
Elvis

 

[ann]

I was told by Ilford last year, that is was basically a name change when they took all production back to england.

 

[Early Riser]

I use Ilford Hypam, it's a rapid fixer, different from Ilford Rapid Fix. I think IRF may have some hardner added, not certain, but Hypam serves the same purpose, it's also a good deal cheaper than IRF.

 

[Tom Hoskinson]

I use Ilford Hypam, it's a rapid fixer, different from Ilford Rapid Fix. I think IRF may have some hardner added, not certain, but Hypam serves the same purpose, it's also a good deal cheaper than IRF.

Ilford Rapid Fix contains no Hardener. From The IRF MSDS the list of ingredients is:
Sodium Sulfite
Acetic Acid
Water
Ammonium Thiosulfate

Clearly, No hardener is listed in the IRF MSDS

In addition Ilford, state:
1. The current version of Hypam Fixer is rebadged Ilford Rapid Fixer
2. There is no hardener in either IRF or Hypam - if you want hardener you must add it yourself.

 

[Early Riser]

Tom, you're right about the hardener aspect, however Hypam also has Boric acid in it, whereas I believe that Rapid fix does not. Also Rod Parsons of Ilford was in my darkroom about a month or two ago and I think he mentioned that there was some difference but that Hypam was fine for use with the Ilford archival wash system.

 

[Tom Hoskinson]

According to the latest sds sheets from Ilford:

http://www.ilford.com/html/us_english/sds/sds.asp

There are three very minor differences between Hypam Fixer and Ilford Rapid Fixer.

1. Hypam Fixer contains some Sodium Acetate (the sodium salt of acetic acid) the Sodium Acetate would tend to act as a pH buffer for the Acetic acid.
Ilford Rapid Fixer does not contain Sodium Acetate.
2. Hypam Fixer contains some Boric Acid, Ilford Rapid Fixer does not.
3. The pH of the Hypam Fixer concentrate is listed as 5.1 The pH of the Ilford Rapid Fixer concentrate is listed as 5

Sounds to me like these two acid fixing concentrates should function pretty much the same. Buy the cheapest one - or buy some 60% Ammonium Thiosulfate instead.

 

[Tom Hoskinson]

One last thought regarding boric acid in fixers. At one point in time, Ilford advocated the use of boric acid as the only source of acid in an acid hardening fixer. They believed that the boric acid would enhance the shelf life of a hardening fixer.

However, use of a hardening fixer is counter productive if you are trying to fix and wash your fim and prints to archival standards.

 

[Marco Gilardetti]

This was supposed to go in b/w photography, right? Or am I missing some interesting application of hypam in color process?