Sistan/Ag-Stab destroyed most of my portfolio

[Thomas Bertilsson]

I'm glad you know how to wash prints. With that I'm completely out of suggestions, since contamination of prints usually occurs when they are not washed properly.

Good luck with solving your problem.

Guys, it's not the wash; give that one up already or do the diffusion-rate calculations and go argue in a washing thread. This is RC and not FB, you don't need to drown it for two hours and residual-hypo testing shows that my prints are sufficiently washed or maybe even over-washed. PE: I'm not talking about film; that gets a 10+ minute wash with about 20 changes (much more than the Ilford method suggests), and the water comes out completely clear by about halfway through. My film bases are completely clear, no trace of pink/purple/etc in Acros/TMY. Believe me, I can wash stuff.

As to "why Jobo?", it's space constraints. I can process 20x24" in it no worries but couldn't even put down two trays of that size. If I'm making lots of 8x10", I can process 6 at a time in it. It's not inefficient or ineffective, it uses less chemistry and it means I can work in my laundry with just a 650x2500mm bench that holds sink, Jobo and enlarger. And I can process C41+RA4 with good process control and no dying of fumes or amine sensitisation.

It's not contamination from the back of the print behind because the top print on each pile was often the worst affected. If it were fixer contamination from when the prints were originally processed, why did they keep absolutely perfectly for 5-6 years in the very same piles before I added any Sistan?

There are no ozone sources in the building, not even a CRT. Again, no degradation on prints stored in boxes for 5+ years without Sistan.

I'm buying a squeegee for my RC, re-printing a bunch of stuff on FB and calling it a day I think.

 

[MDR]

Once again a copy of the instructions for Adostab this time in German and in English the german version is a bit more specific.

"Achtung! Eine zu hohe AG STAB-Konzentration kann zu Flecken führen, die erst nach einiger Zeit sichtbar werden – vor allem, wenn die Bilder in engem Kontakt liegen (Stapellagerung). Es ist deshalb darauf zu achten, daß die Vorder- und Rückseiten der Bilder vor dem Trocknen abgestreift werden, damit nicht durch eintrocknende AG STAB -Tropfen eine partielle Überkonzentration entsteht."

Attention Too high a AG-Stab concentration can lead to stains which take some time to appear - particularly if prints are in close contact (stored stacked). Care should then be taken that the
fronts and backs of negatives are wiped before drying to avoid partial over-concentration caused by dried drops of AG-Stab"

I am sorry to say but to me everythings points to unintentional operator error caused by not completely following the instructions provided by Adox/Agfa. Also did the frames you used have a wood fibre backs if so this can cause stains as well.

And again I am very sorry for your loss and hope that you can at least salvage some of your prints. You also don't have to give up RC printing use a Goldtoner or Seleniumtoner and your print will be protected. You use an interleave or mount your prints onto an acid free mat board before storing

Good Luck

 

[georg16nik]

+1 MDR and what PE already said.

...
I am sorry to say but to me everythings points to unintentional operator error caused by not completely following the instructions provided by Adox/Agfa. Also did the frames you used have a wood fibre backs if so this can cause stains as well....

 

[Roger Cole]

That's horrible!

I don't think AgSTAB is in market anymore. Last time I looked, it wasn't sold by anyone, at least in US. If that is the case, I don't think the manufacture will even care to troubleshoot.

Is this the same thing?

http://www.freestylephoto.biz/12056-Adolux-Adostab-Sistan-Image-Stabilizer-With-Wetting-Agent-1L

 

[MDR]

Yes it should be

 

[Simon R Galley]

Dear Polyglot,

Bad, bad news..... I feel for you.

I have never used SISTAN before, but nor have I ever heard of any issues before, some hope from the posts though, hopefully PE can help.

Simon. ILFORD Photo / HARMAN technology Limited :

 

[DREW WILEY]

I apologize for a sorta-side-discussion, but now I get it, PE ... I've always thought of Jobo drums are relatively ineffective in certain ways.
Mine were originally designed by someone called David Seriqui as wash-in drums. You might remember him as the fellow who once offered
the finest thermoregulators on the market. But he also made very high quality drums out of expensive noryl plastic, which fill and drain far
more efficiently than Jobo. But like I said, it is my custom to supplement this in-drum wash with a final tray/Kodak siphon wash. Maybe a
carryover from my Ciba days. ... But on to RC B&W. It is my understanding that UV induces some kind of chemical reaction to the titanium brightener which is bad for the RC layer. Maybe this was cured long ago. Maybe not. What are your thoughts about this?

 

[Photo Engineer]

UV causes free radical oxygen to form when it strikes TiO2. This is what gave the original RC papers a bad name because they yellowed and cracked. It turns out that Vitamin E is a "Free Radical Chain Stopper" which terminates the bad reaction, and a friend of mine at EK used this and incorporated a variant into the RC thus solving the problem. This is all in a series of patents, and I was involved in the testing in the '60s. By the time I left the project, we were on Version 504C of RC and it was very stable to UV.

PE

 

[AgX]

TiO2 first was used as white pigment, then its catalytic properties showed up and in some applications meanwhile it is its major feature.

In whitening polyethylene (which pure already is very succeptible to UV-radiation) this combination of the TiO2 features showed detrimental.

As PE indicated that problem with TiO2 is meanwhile attended.

There also is white base material that does not contain TiO2 at all. Though not employed photographically.

 

[DREW WILEY]

Thanks to both of you. I know that TiO2 prices have skyrocketed in the past few years. Paper doesn't need much; but getting a pure grade
means competing with far bigger industries. And right now large-volume demand is on the horizon for deliberately trapping atmospheric contaminants. Traditionally it's used for whitening everything from toothpaste to table salt (yep, read the box - salt ain't always just salt). But premium grade house paints are what have taken the biggest price hit, since cheaper CaCO3 and silica are very poor substitutes for TiO2.

 

[mnemosyne]

Polyglot, first let me say I feel sorry for the loss you have experienced.

I have been reading through the thread and you mention that some of your prints showed bronzing/silvering out and that was the reason why you started to worry and use Sistan for your not (yet) affected prints in the first place.
Now, I have 25-30 year old b&w RC prints that were processed and stored "normally" and not to any rules of "archival standards", and still I have never seen anything like bronzing/silvering out. That you experience this kind of problems at all (irrespective of the Sistan disaster) IMO is an indication that there might be something wrong with your workflow. I suggest you do not simply assume that your worfklow in regard to fix and wash is okay, but you actually check and verify it with one of the methods available. Rule out you have a weak link there. You surely do not want to face the same problem again a couple of years down the road!

In regard to the Sistan issue, apart from and addition to the already discussed and known problem of overconcentration by residual solution on the print surface, I started to wonder if there might have been other causes contributing to the problem. So I simply checked where your workflow differs from the "normal" Sistan workflow, which is reportedly "safe", and here is some food for thought (for everyone):

First, the prints put into the solution were not coming directly from rinse, that is "wet" (like in a normal workflow), but from storage, that is "dry". I wonder if this could have led to a kind of overaction or overconcentration of Sistan in the emulsion?

Second, you mention that you treated your prints outside and then dried them in "open shade", which means they would be exposed to a certain level of UV light during the treatment and while drying. I am asking myself if this could have led to some kind of interaction with the stabilizing process that contributed to the problem?

 

[polyglot]

mnemosyne: I suggest you go read the bronzing thread. The cause is UV on the TiO2 brighteners releasing oxygen radicals, which affect the silver image (freeing silver ions which can then migrate to the surface) if it is held in a sealed frame. If you store prints in the dark (no radicals formed) or don't put glass in front of them (radicals outgas with little/no damage), or use probably any paper other than Foma (Ilford and Kodak at least included agents to neutralize the radicals), it doesn't happen. It's a well-documented effect, unrelated to washing, and it's not just me. And I test my washing for retained silver and thiosulfate.

Putting a dry print in may increase the concentration, yes. Might have raised the risk of damage due to poor wiping.

UV exposure while wet shouldn't matter as there is (meant to be) no chemical process occurring when Sistan is applied. The protection is due to the thiocyanate forming stable complexes with the free silver ions, if/when they are released by an oxygen radical.

 

[removed account4]

SNIP SNIP

If you store prints in the dark (no radicals formed) or don't put glass in front of them (radicals outgas with little/no damage), or use probably any paper other than Foma (Ilford and Kodak at least included agents to neutralize the radicals), it doesn't happen.

is this something with their new papers ?
i was getting silvering out with both ilford and kodak papers
but this was a long time ago ... the 1980s/1990s ...

 

[AgX]

The cause is UV on the TiO2 brighteners releasing oxygen radicals, which affect the silver image (freeing silver ions which can then migrate to the surface) if it is held in a sealed frame.

TiO2 is not a brightener, just a neutral, higly reflective pigment. A white pigment, used to turn a clear plastic into an opaque, reflectice one.

 

[Photo Engineer]

If you read the article by Ctein, you will find that proper washing will prevent bronzing when RC is used. Of course, using a top tier RC paper will help.

TiO2 is mixed WITH brighteners depending on company and paper formulation. This can cause yellowing with time as the brightener degrades. Top tier papers again avoid this problem as much as possible by using the best brighteners.

PE

 

[RalphLambrecht]

titanium dioxide is known as the whitest man-made material and isalso used as awite reference patch in paint research.I'm lucky to own one of these patches and use it for my densitimeter calibration.

 

[Sal Santamaura]

If you read the article by Ctein, you will find that proper washing will prevent bronzing when RC is used...

Actually, Ctein's testing confirmed that proper washing without subsequent treatment will assure bronzing and silvering out.

For an update about how even light selenium toning is sufficient to ensure substantial RC print longevity, see this thread:

(there was a url link here which no longer exists)​

 

[Ronald Moravec]

Washing in the Jobo tube with a brief rinse afterward doesn't sound like a good idea to me, even with RC prints. When I was processing color in rotary drums with some regularity (C-prints and Cibachrome), I would still wash with running water in a tray.

Nothing wrong with tube washing, just change water every 30 sec and fill it at least 25%.

 

[Gerald C Koch]

I'd had problems with a couple of Foma RC prints (there was a url link here which no longer exists) when framed, and Sistan was recommended as a good preventative measure. So I bought a bottle, made up a batch and processed basically my whole back-archives of B&W RC prints, including from other paper vendor

Bronzing of early RC papers has been well researched. It appears when prints are mounted under glass. There is a reaction between moisture, UV radiation and titanium dioxide which results in an attack on the plastic substrate. This causes yellowing and cracking. Blaming Sistan for this is a classic post hoc ergo propter hic logical fallacy. Newer papers were reformulated to prevent this from happening. It also brings up another matter. When mounting prints under glass the mount should allow the paper to "breath." Prints may outgas for years and the chemical products should not be allowed to accumulate.

 

[polyglot]

Bronzing of early RC papers has been well researched. It appears when prints are mounted under glass. There is a reaction between moisture, UV radiation and titanium dioxide which results in an attack on the plastic substrate. This causes yellowing and cracking. Blaming Sistan for this is a classic post hoc ergo propter hic logical fallacy. Newer papers were reformulated to prevent this from happening. It also brings up another matter. When mounting prints under glass the mount should allow the paper to "breath." Prints may outgas for years and the chemical products should not be allowed to accumulate.

You're confusing the chain of events here. The bronzing was before sistan was applied; allowing little dribbles of sistan to remain on the prints caused severe bleaching.

 

[RalphLambrecht]

I'd had problems with a couple of Foma RC prints (there was a url link here which no longer exists) when framed, and Sistan was recommended as a good preventative measure. So I bought a bottle, made up a batch and processed basically my whole back-archives of B&W RC prints, including from other paper vendors.

Well, that was a Really Stupid thing to do, because it has destroyed over half of my prints with serious bleaching in disgusting dribbly patterns that formed over about 8 weeks in dark storage. I'm talking about the loss of hundreds of dollars of paper and hundreds of hours of darkroom work here - prints that were in perfect condition are now good only for the bin - and I am extremely angry about it. I'll post some scans tomorrow, but believe me, the damage varies from "a spot" to "catastrophic"; it seems to be increasing and I suspect that I am going to lose all of my RC B&W prints. About 6 years worth!

Consider yourself warned in the most dire fashion possible.

That's terrible,I feel for you;AFAIK, this only happens with highly concentrated Sistanthat is not properly wiped off.I use Sistan in addition to toning and did not notice any negative effect over the last 20 years with Agfa,Kodak or Ilford papers. but a long-term stability test didn't show any benefit either

 

[RobC]

but a long-term stability test didn't show any benefit either

If a stability test didn't show any change over 20 years then isn't that a good thing or were you expecting some kind of improvement? :confused:

 

[RalphLambrecht]

If a stability test didn't show any change over 20 years then isn't that a good thing or were you expecting some kind of improvement? :confused:

I was expecting a difference between using it or not but there was none.Aslong as a print is mildly toned it is ok for decades!

 

[RobC]

I was expecting a difference between using it or not but there was none.Aslong as a print is mildly toned it is ok for decades!

Yes I'd agree with that. I don't think any of my 20+ year old Ilford RC prints have shown any degredation and they were NOT toned or treated. They were well washed though.

And there are many 100 year old prints that weren't toned which are still in good condition. A lot aren't becasue of inadeqaute fixing and/or washing but we know better these days about what archival washing means.

Frankly if anyone actually wants to own or display any of my prints in 30 or 50 years then I'd be happy and I would expect that if they were all untreated they will probably last at least 70 years and a lot more for FB, But only if they are well looked after in good environmental conditions.

It's the environmental conditions which are the real killer of photographs over the longer term regardless of what's been done to them. And you have no control over that once they've left your ownership. All you can do is to give them a good start in life.

 

[Photo Engineer]

I have tested Sistan type materials as a function of wash and have found that the Sistan chemistry effect goes up as wash quality goes down. So far my tests are nearly 10 years old. With the right combination of chemistry and time, I can fully wash an RC print in 15".

PE