Silver flouride - has it ever been used In Photography?

[Gerald C Koch]

Silver fluoride reacts VIOLENTLY with water.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Silver(II)_fluoride

 

[avb]

Silver fluoride reacts VIOLENTLY with water.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Silver(II)_fluoride

That's AgF2. We're talking about AgF.

 

[Gerald C Koch]

That's AgF2. We're talking about AgF.

Fluorine is such a powerful oxidizing agent that it forces other elements into their highest oxidation states. Silver (II) is the end product of most attempts to make AgF. Read the link that I posted.

 

[Rudeofus]

Nothing in this Wikipedia article says that AgF2 will form from Fluoride and Ag(I) ions. I would assume, that Ag2O and HF would form AgF, not AgF2, not that I would want to be the one making either ...

It appears to be quite pricey, much more so than Silver Chloride or Silver Nitrate, so its synthesis and/or purification may not be all that straight forward.

 

[Photo Engineer]

The patents cited here and elsewhere granted to Polaroid describe evaporated Fluorides that form images directly and are not processed. Any attempt to use Fluorides has failed due to the solubility or stability of the Fluorides. There was a discussion on this topic in the thread on halides in making light sensitive materials.

PE

 

[Gerald C Koch]

Nothing in this Wikipedia article says that AgF2 will form from Fluoride and Ag(I) ions. I would assume, that Ag2O and HF would form AgF, not AgF2, not that I would want to be the one making either ...

It appears to be quite pricey, much more so than Silver Chloride or Silver Nitrate, so its synthesis and/or purification may not be all that straight forward.

The article states that the main method of preparation is from silver oxide and elemental fluorine.

 

[Rudeofus]

The article states that the main method of preparation is from silver oxide and elemental fluorine.

That's if you want to make AgF2, which is an even crazier compound than the suggested AgF. While the latter is probably not a nice compound to have near you, the former is deep in "Derek Lowe Blog" territory.

 

[Gerald C Koch]

Digging a little further all this discussion appears to be moot as AgF is not photosensitive. This would be expected as the electron structure of fluorine indicates that it would be extremely difficult to remove an electron from the fluoride ion. This would be necessary to form a silver atom from a silver ion.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Silver(I)_fluoride

 

[cliveh]

But what if Fuoride could be controlled in a stable compound not yet discovered, but still yield a photosensitive reaction?

 

[pdeeh]

Have you been at the ether again Clive?

 

[cliveh]

Sadly yes pdeeh, I have trouble controlling my imagination.

 

[Rudeofus]

But what if Fuoride could be controlled in a stable compound not yet discovered, but still yield a photosensitive reaction?

The wikipedia article Jerry cited even states, that the dihydrate is somewhat photo sensitive. It's not yet clear, though, why AgF would offer any advantages. Given, that modern photographic film doesn't even use Silver Chloride, and that the most sensitive emulsions are high in Iodide. one would reasonably expect much more interesting results from Silver Astatide instead of Silver Fluoride, although a AgAt emulsion would fog up quickly due to the radioactive nature of Astatine, though.

Let's assume for a second, that

1. Thousands and thousands of pages about photo sensitive materials have been published, none of them putting serious effort into silver halides beyond AgCl, AgBr and AgI
   
2. Tens or hundreds of thousands of pages about photo sensitive materials have been kept as trade secrets by bug film makers
3. There were multi billion dollar research budgets thrown at this problem, still no known products outside of AgCl, AgBr and AgI
   
4. Photographic film was used for military surveillance and clandestine work, so products would have been made even if they would have been way to expensive for normal consumer products.
5. Classified work gets routinely declassified after many years, still no indication of any viable AgF based film product.

Let's face it: the likelihood, that we discover a new, and superior photo sensitive compound, is extremely low. Let's rather focus on making good use of the products which already exist.

 

[dE fENDER]

But what if Fuoride could be controlled in a stable compound not yet discovered, but still yield a photosensitive reaction?

Inorganic compounds had been studied quite well, fluororganic ones are quite dangerous mostly. And you need an equipped chem lab and financial support to find out something new and usefull..

 

[Photo Engineer]

Well, here is another argument against.

As you go down in the halogen series in MW, the light sensitivity moves from the visible region to UV radiation. Thus, AgI is "greenish" sensitive, AgBr is "blue" sensitive and AgCl is "UV-short visible" sensitive thus moving hypsochromically from about 500 nm to 450 nm to 350 nm for maximum sensitivity. The Polaroid patent cited elsewhere notes that a heavy UV exposure was needed to expose titular AgF deposit therefore showing the further movement. It is not "light" sensitive but has some weak UV sensitivity and that is far weaker than AgCl which is pretty fast at that wavelength.

Fluoro-organics are, in many cases, quite low in toxicity. An example is Triamcinolone, a Fluoride derivative of Prednisone. They are not considered light sensitive by any means.

PE

 

[ME Super]

There are actually 5 compounds called "Silver Fluoride." They are:

1. Silver Subfluoride (Ag2)
2. Silver(I) Fluoride (AgF)
3. Silver(II) Fluoride (AgF2)
4. Silver(III) Fluoride (AgF3)
5. Silver diamine Fluoride

All are water soluble. Silver(III) Fluoride spontaneously decomposes in a few hours. Silver(II) Fluoride is "too expensive for large-scale industrial use), with world-wide demand being around 100kg/year This is also the compound that reacts violenly with water, as mentioned earlier in the thread. Silver(I) Fluoride is not appreciably light sensitive, although its dihydrate is. Silver Subfluoride readily precipitates silver in water. Silver diamine fluoride is used in dentistry.

That Silver(I) fluoride isn't appreciably light-sensitive, plus the water solubility of the first four of the ones listed, IMHO pretty much precludes its use in photography.

See https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Silver_fluoride for more info.

 

[pdeeh]

Yeah but this is just like all so-called "science" yeah?
I read on the Internet that some guy said the guvmint doesn't want us to know about this because the Bilderberg group yeah?

 

[AgX]

There are actually 5 compounds called "Silver Fluoride." They are:

1. Silver Subfluoride (Ag2)

Silver Subfluoride = Ag2F

 

[ME Super]

Yeah that was a typo. Thanks for correcting it!

 

[Gerald C Koch]

An emulsion is prepared by precipitating an insoluble silver halide in the emulsion mixture. Since silver (I) fluoride is soluble in water this cannot be done.

 

[Rudeofus]

Just because something is water soluble doesn't prevent one from coating it onto suitable material - cf. Cyanotype and similar processes.

 

[removed account4]

Yeah but this is just like all so-called "science" yeah?
I read on the Internet that some guy said the guvmint doesn't want us to know about this because the Bilderberg group yeah?

klaus, is that the dead puppy polka you are playing ?

 

[pdeeh]

klaus, is that the dead puppy polka you are playing ?

Boy oh boy that's niche!
But I'm taking a break from apug banter today as I've just been reading about the Manchester bombing and it just seems inappropriate for me. Catch you later in the week.

 

[Gerald C Koch]

Just because something is water soluble doesn't prevent one from coating it onto suitable material - cf. Cyanotype and similar processes.

Cyanotypes work on a different principle than the silver halide process. Silver gelatin emulsions are light sensitive due to the silver halide crystals. You could try making a gelatin emulsion with some soluble light sensitive silver compound like silver acetate but I don't think it would work very well.