Recommendation on graduated cylinders?

Patrick Robert James · Apr 14, 2022

I've been using the same plastic graduates for almost 30 years now. I've dropped them a few times but superglue always fixed them. I've been thinking of retiring them though since they have a lot of wear on them at this point. Battle scars I guess.

I bought a 25ml glass pipette a while back for measuring Rodinal but it reads reversed so I don't really know how to use it. Fill it all the way then push it back down? No idea. Anyone have a suggestion on that I am all ears.

My feeling on these things these days is you might as well get good ones. You'll probably have them the rest of your life.

mshchem · Apr 14, 2022

Steve Goldstein said:
I have a couple of those pharmaceutical (conical-shaped) PMP “cylinders” that mschchem pictured. Mine are not accurate!

I used 10ml and 50ml volumetric flasks to check all my others. I believe they’re accurate - 5 fills of the made-in-China 10ml flask just hits the line on my 50ml made-in-USA ONE. The 300ml, 600ml, and 1200ml Patersons are accurate, as are my 10ml glass and plastic cylinders and various smaller ones (25ml, 50ml, 100ml). But the conical one holds about 5% more than any of the others for a given volume mark.

Note that by “accurate” I really mean self-consistent because I have no way to verify absolute accuracy. Everything agrees for every comparison I’ve done except that conical one.

Does it matter? Maybe, maybe not. I have other options so I don’t use the conical one any longer. Fortunately I bought it many years ago before the price got silly.

Volumetric flasks are calibrated To Contain (TC). Graduates are calibrated To Deliver. If you want to check your cylinders you need 20°C distilled water and a decent balance. I worked in analytical labs most of my early years, the real genuine Nalgene graduates are quite good.

mshchem · Apr 14, 2022

The ordinary Paterson and Jobo graduates are very nice, practical and inexpensive. I acquired a new Jobo kit to get the rollers, came with a 1540 tank and the works. Has a 50ml graduate that looks beautiful.

mshchem · Apr 14, 2022

Patrick Robert James said:
I've been using the same plastic graduates for almost 30 years now. I've dropped them a few times but superglue always fixed them. I've been thinking of retiring them though since they have a lot of wear on them at this point. Battle scars I guess.

I bought a 25ml glass pipette a while back for measuring Rodinal but it reads reversed so I don't really know how to use it. Fill it all the way then push it back down? No idea. Anyone have a suggestion on that I am all ears.

My feeling on these things these days is you might as well get good ones. You'll probably have them the rest of your life.

Pipettes and Pipettors: 3 Terms to Know | Antylia Scientific Blog

Pipettes and pipettors are fundamental components of lab experiments and are ever-present in laboratories. Learn more about these lab instruments.

www.coleparmer.co.uk

If you have a pipet marked 25ml 20°C TD. This is a TO DELIVER pipet. You fill it to the calibrated line, then hold the tip against a glass beaker and let it drain. The problem with a glass pipet is these are designed for aqueous solutions. Rodinal is too viscous. Better to use a small graduate. I have 10mL and 50 mL Nalgene cylinders, the small Paterson versions work great.

Steve Goldstein · Apr 14, 2022

mshchem said:
Volumetric flasks are calibrated To Contain (TC). Graduates are calibrated To Deliver. If you want to check your cylinders you need 20°C distilled water and a decent balance. I worked in analytical labs most of my early years, the real genuine Nalgene graduates are quite good.

I actually did my initial testing with distilled water and a trusted digital scale, all at the marked temperature. That allowed me to verify my 100ml graduate, which I then used as a transfer standard. It’s also how I found that my pharmacist’s graduate (conical PMP) was off by about 5%.

And yes, I know my pickiness level was on the high side, but I’m retired, it was Covid, and I was curious.

bdial · Apr 14, 2022

I've never bought from them, but American Science and Surplus has glass and plastic beakers and graduates.

beaker

www.sciplus.com

I have a collection of plastic Kodak , Jobo and Paterson graduates in various sizes up to 2000 ml. I suppose my favorites are the soft plastic Kodak ones, but only because that's what I started off using way back when. I do have at least one of the Kodak funnel shaped glass ones, but it's decoration. I prefer plastic for the darkroom so that drops don't result in loose chemicals and broken glass.

snusmumriken · Apr 14, 2022

I have an un-graduated 1 litre stainless steel beaker for mixing chemicals from powder; also used to warm cold chemicals in a water bath. Otherwise all my volume measuring is done in acrylic Paterson cylinders, which are plenty accurate enough, don’t stain, and last a lifetime (at least). I have some cheap poly-something graduated beakers in which to measure out approximate quantities of stock film developer which go straight into the developing tank (and back again when time’s up). These stain significantly, so each beaker is labelled and although rinsed after each session is only ever used for that one chemical.
If I need to measure >1l of something (eg washaid), I use a small bucket which I have graduated internally with a magic marker pen. I really don’t understand why others worry to achieve greater accuracy than this.

mshchem · Apr 14, 2022

Steve Goldstein said:
I actually did my initial testing with distilled water and a trusted digital scale, all at the marked temperature. That allowed me to verify my 100ml graduate, which I then used as a transfer standard. It’s also how I found that my pharmacist’s graduate (conical PMP) was off by about 5%.

And yes, I know my pickiness level was on the high side, but I’m retired, it was Covid, and I was curious.

I love it! Pickyness is fun.

McDiesel · Apr 14, 2022

I am too looking forward for hands-on recommendations. My problems with my cylinders and graduates are:

The scales are translucent and hard to read.
Imperial markings are useless and only get in the way.
Glass doesn't work (see below) and my plastic ones are too opaque: hard to see the level of liquid.

I love glass, but it does not survive minor drops (chest level into the sink) and its temperature insulation is awful. I can't leave a developer in a glass container for too long. Maintaining even 24C becomes an issue if my ambient is 20C, and 38C drops like a rock.

My ideal solution would be fully-transparent plastic material with contrasty / black metric-only scales.

mshchem · Apr 14, 2022

What I have. I've scrounged these up from Ebay. New prices exceed $30 us. These withstand anything I've used in my darkroom. These are OK for boiling water, never tried that

mshchem · Apr 14, 2022

DREW WILEY · Apr 14, 2022

It can be quite difficult to read the exact solution level measurement with a frog swimming in there. Some of the witches' brew developer formulas call for live frogs.

As far as markings go, on bigger cylinders having ml's, US fluid oz increments, and Brit fl oz, all on different sides, can be helpful. On small cylinders, I prefer metric only. British fluid ounces are important because those are the ones which take a live frog into account. ... "double, double, toil, and trouble" .... It's a shame that Napoleon didn't win at Waterloo
and leave us with ONLY the metric system to contend with.

grahamp · Apr 14, 2022

And we'd be speaking French. Though we (the UK and inheritors) managed to suppress/adopt/mangle Norman French in the near 1,000 years since William I.

I'm really thankful for Metric volumes, though. Much more flexible than fluid ounces or gills.

DREW WILEY · Apr 14, 2022

(dread) ... My first name is actually the family name of my Grandmother. But only recently did I learn that it's anglicized from Dreaux, the French Huguenot clan chased out of France.

I ran out of patience with the Brit measurement system way back when I sold precision tools and fasteners to all kind of import auto dealers. ... Reverse threaded Whitworth-Micro-cubit grade 8 bolts made from twisted red deer antlers and so forth.

Patrick Robert James · Apr 16, 2022

If you have the plastic ones and can't read the numbers or the lines, just take a sharpie and run it over the projections. Makes it simple. I did that with mine on the most used measurements, for example, 25ml. Now I can see the line without having to stick my nose up close.

BAC1967 · Apr 16, 2022

I just bought a 1L Pyrex beaker on Amazon for $18.80. The fear of breaking it has me worried but I thought it would work good with my magnetic mixer. The old Kodak glass is the best, I have the 32oz and 8oz. Tap Plastics is a great source for affordable graduated containers.

Vintage Kodak Glass Beaker by Bryan Chernick, on Flickr

GRHazelton · Apr 16, 2022

Good to learn about the "to deliver" markings. IIRC from college chemistry one should read a graduated cylinder, burette, etc, to the bottom of the meniscus. Odd that no one mentioned this. I've been using a "nest" of plastic graduates, from 50ml up to 500ml or 1 liter. Where I got them I can't remember.

snusmumriken · Apr 17, 2022

GRHazelton said:
Good to learn about the "to deliver" markings. IIRC from college chemistry one should read a graduated cylinder, burette, etc, to the bottom of the meniscus. Odd that no one mentioned this.

Correct. Also that you should use the smallest measure that will contain the required amount; and that a tall thin measure is more accurate than a broad short one. But photography isn’t analytical chemistry - the commonly available darkroom measures (eg Paterson) balance adequate accuracy with practicality.

guangong · Apr 17, 2022

I use glass, much easier to clean. Besides cylinders and flasks, I use glass beakers. Stainless steel for mixing very large quantities. Have owned this stuff since early 1970s. My balance was a gift from manager of chemical apparatus store when I was a kid in laten1940s. Still works. Plastic just too difficult to clean. If I were to start from scratch, I would use the Kodak glass items.

BMbikerider · Apr 23, 2022

I use the plastic type that came with my JOBO processor but only because they were designed to fit in the holders. For really accurate measurement I have a number of Laboratory Pyrex graduated measures that are certified as accurate and have the quantities etched into the outside of the glass in black so I know exactly how much I am measuring, The tall thin 50cc and 100cc measures have been carelessly knocked over a number of times and they simply bounced on the worktop. The larger 500cc and 1000cc measures are not certified but are very accurate and also have stood a few knocks along the way. The only downside with the certified measures is they are expensive.

Another reason I choose to use glass measures comes from a leaflet in a Tetenal E6 kit that mixing of measures for different individual concentrates in plastic is that these can become semi absorbent after a number of years use and this can affect the 1st and 2nd developer concentrates. Glass does not. I don't process E6 now because it is too expensive but I still prefer glass for C41 and RA4.

The plastic ones in my JOBO are clearly marked 'Developer' 'Bleach' and 'Fix', so I don't cross use and they never get used for anything else.

eurekaiv · Apr 29, 2022

I have a few Pyrex lab grade cylinders I picked up on eBay used, in a set for maybe $30? They‘re quite nice, and red sided which for me, makes them far far easier to read quickly and accurately. I have them in 25, 50 and 100ml sizes to complement the set of vintage 250, 500 and 1000ml Kodak beakers (like ones posted above) my wife gifted me last year. I like glass mostly but I often use my old plastic 1000ml measure if I need to warm or cool chems a lot as the glass tends to continue conducting after pulling it from the bath.

Craig · May 25, 2022

I have some glass graduated cylinders in 10ml and 50ml for measuring concentrates like Rodinal, but for most chemistry I use Erlenmeyer flasks. I have them in 125ml, 500ml and 1L sizes.

I bought them from a local science supply place that specializes in selling to students and schools and they were quite affordable, I think the 1L flask was under $20.

Paul Howell · May 25, 2022

I bought a set of glass graduates and beakers along with brown bottles from ASU surplus, maybe 30 years ago, all are holding up well, never doubled checked to accurate they are. I also have a few vintage plastic Kodak and Patterson graduates, the Kodak is so brown that I cannot read the measurements.

Duceman · Jun 6, 2022

I forgot to update this thread with what I eventually bought. Local photo store had a graduated 1L and 100cc, both plastic, so that's what I purchased.

ivannavi · Jun 12, 2022

I've have been using "laboratory glassware" in the darkroom since years ago and to be honest I find it more comfortable and trustable and a lot more easy to keeps clean than the equivalent from photographic brands. With few "Griffin" beakers on different sizes you can do almost everything. I only use a pyrex glass graduated cylinders for small quantities or even a pyrex glass graduated pipette for even smaller quantities (almost never). A general purpose mercury lab thermometer and few glass stirring rods would be a nice upgrade too.

Recommendation on graduated cylinders?

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