Staining...Cause?

ToddB said:

Thanks guys.. I'll stop by my local camera joint and get some stop bath. How many minutes in it? I should mention that this is my first buy for this paper. So I treated like I did with Arista EDU paper. But I can certainly make an adjustment to my process. Oh.. BTW.. I use tongs for each bath. I'm very careful about cross contamination. So, Should continue doing the two seprate fix baths @ 3:00 min in each if I'm going to add in Stop station? Hi Simon, Thanks for chiming in. I absolutly love this paper.

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Which Kodak fixer are you using? The powdered fixer, the liquid Kodafix or the Kodak Rapid fixer?

Kodak recommends 5 - 10 minutes for a single tray and the powdered fixer and fibre paper - that is assuming a 15 second dip in stop bath (with agitation).

So 3 minutes in each fix tray should suffice, although 4 minutes each would be extra safe.

By the way, the Kodak capacity numbers are 26 sheets of 8x10 paper per litre of working strength fixer.

More info here: http://www.kodak.com/global/en/professional/support/techPubs/e103cp/e103cp.pdf

Powder fix...Gallon Bag. Stopping by grocery store tonight and making a batch. 1-4 ratio on batch?

Todd

ToddB said:

Powder fix...Gallon Bag. Stopping by grocery store tonight and making a batch. 1-4 ratio on batch?

Todd

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Why the grocery store? It is designed to be used with tap water - unless you have really strange tap water.

The powdered fixer is mixed to working strength. Just make up the gallon according to the instructions on the package, and use it as is.

If you have been diluting it further, your films and prints are not properly fixed!

The liquid concentrate fixers are different.

OOps, ment the Vinegar.. for stop bath.

ToddB said:

So, Should continue doing the two seprate fix baths @ 3:00 min in each if I'm going to add in Stop station? Hi Simon, Thanks for chiming in. I absolutly love this paper.

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Yes bathA and bathB desirable for archival fix.

All the stop does is kill developer activity to reduce the risk of stain in fix.

White wine vinegar should be ok instead of photo shop bottle.

You should have a rule set for discarding bathA & replace by bathB etc. ?

Vinegar works well but I don't like the sour smell. I like to use citric acid instead. 1 tablespoon per liter works for me.

Heck.. I even have an empty distilled water jug I can use to put in Stop bath and a sharpie pen to label.. Is the solution reuable?

Todd

Just like acetic acid. Vinegar.

ToddB said:

Heck.. I even have an empty distilled water jug I can use to put in Stop bath and a sharpie pen to label.. Is the solution reuable?

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1. You don't need distilled water for stop bath, because its low pH will prevent water hardness from causing precipitates. But yes, you can use an empty water container for preparing and storing a stop bath.
2. You can store and reuse an Acetic Acid based stop bath. It smells if used in open trays, not everybody likes this. Anything from straight vinegar (5% Acetic Acid) to vinegar diluted 1+9 will work, but capacity depends on concentration.
3. A stop bath made from Citric Acid and water alone will grow fungus over time. It works well and is odorless, but you can't store it.
4. Both of these stop bathes fail silently, i.e. they don't look or smell different if their pH has gone up from developer carryover to the point where they won't stop development. Commercial stop bathes contain an indicator and a preservative, therefore I would recommend these to less experienced printers. They're cheap and last a long time.

ToddB said:

Heck.. I even have an empty distilled water jug I can use to put in Stop bath and a sharpie pen to label.. Is the solution reuable?

Todd

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Yes but when it stops being a stop bath your prints stain...

I've had stains in the developer from using contaminated fingers to handle the prints. Some papers were far more susceptible to this problem than others.

If you are going to use vinegar, it should be white, distilled vinegar. I would be careful of something labelled "wine" vinegar.

Vinegar is relatively cheap. Try diluting it something like 1 + 4, and check its operation regularly - a scrap of photographic paper that has been developed will feel slippery coming from the developer but that slipperiness will disappear in an acidic stop bath. You may have to swap the diluted vinegar for fresh regularly during a printing session.

In contrast, indicator stop bath has an indicator that helps you know when it is time to refresh the solution, as well as published capacity figures.

My suggestion - buy some pure white distilled vinegar for the short term, and order some indicator stop bath for the long term. I like the Ilford, citric acid based product for printing, because it smells better, but the Kodak stuff is cheaper, and there are other alternatives too.

Thanks for the tips guys

Thanks for the tips guys!! I might go indicator option. decisision...

ToddB said:

Thanks for the tips guys!! I might go indicator option. decisision...

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One further point I should have mentioned about the Kodak and Ilford products I have used - the undiluted concentrate can be left in half filled bottles from the manufacturer for a long time. The stuff doesn't seem to go bad as long as the bottle is undamaged.

The concentrates are quite acidic though. There may be some shipping restrictions to deal with. I expect that is why the Ilford product doesn't come in anything larger than 500 ml bottles.