Surge marks on CN film?

[MattKing]

Kodak stopped actually manufacturing these types of photo chemicals around 30 years ago. They used contract manufacturers instead, but maintained the information.
The photo chemical business went to Kodak Alaris as a part of the Kodak bankruptcy in 2013. Kodak Alaris continued to use contract manufacturers, and did their best to ensure that the manufacturers kept making product that was consistent with old product and the existing, never updated documentation. One of those contract manufacturers was also one of the biggest sub-distributors, Sino Promise holdings.
Sino Promise manufacturing of the photo chemicals resulted in some quality and consistency complaints. Much of the photo chemical world experienced a lot of disruption at that time, due to the failure of several players, including in particular Tetenal.
Sino Promise bought the remaining Kodak photo chemical business from Kodak Alaris in 2020.
Sino Promise failed due to the pandemic and other factors.
Rights to the Kodak brand for photo chemicals reverted to Eastman Kodak when Sino Promise failed.
Eastman Kodak last year re-licensed the use of the Kodak brand for photo chemicals to Photo Systems in the USA. Coincidentally Photo Systems has in the past done some of the contract manufacturing.
Ever since the Eastman Kodak bankruptcy, all the interested parties have been attempting to supply product consistent with the old, pre-bankruptcy product, because no one has had the resources to update it and create associated new documentation.
And to make it even more complex, although Eastman Kodak remains the owner of the Kodak name, they do not own a fair number of the individual product names - thus the new names for HC-110, X-Tol and a few others. I'm not sure whether Flexicolor was/is one of those problematic product names. And the irony of that is that the remnant of Sino Promise - which now has a new name - did manage to retain ownership of those product names after the fallout from their failure, and they have been protecting them from Eastman Kodak.
@originalwinslow - the product you have is from the middle of that disruption - several years old - and the mixture of both Kodak Alaris and Sino Promise on the labelling is a bit of a red flag.

 

[mshchem]

One thing I would mention is that the Kodak Flexicolor chemistry came from the former Eastman Kodak China plant in Wuxi. This was not the case with the black and white chemistry.

The China plant in Wuxi went under with SinoPromise during the pandemic fallout not due to shoddy product.

 

[MattKing]

One thing I would mention is that the Kodak Flexicolor chemistry came from the former Eastman Kodak China plant in Wuxi. This was not the case with the black and white chemistry.

The China plant in Wuxi went under with SinoPromise during the pandemic fallout not due to shoddy product.

A lot of the SinoPromise related issues may have been due to issues with packaging, shipping and handling.

 

[mshchem]

A lot of the SinoPromise related issues may have been due to issues with packaging, shipping and handling.

I've never had any problems. I've got some product that is older, than the final days of SinoPromise and I've just mixed some of the latest PSI (Developer replenisher) all is fine.

I managed to avoid any problems with the black and white chemistry, I panic bought XTOL when Tetenal failed.

It was much easier when Eastman Kodak distributed the 5L kits for original C-41 (not RA) and the E6 chemistry. But that was eons ago.

 

[MattKing]

I've never had any problems. I've got some product that is older, than the final days of SinoPromise and I've just mixed some of the latest PSI (Developer replenisher) all is fine.

I managed to avoid any problems with the black and white chemistry, I panic bought XTOL when Tetenal failed.

It was much easier when Eastman Kodak distributed the 5L kits for original C-41 (not RA) and the E6 chemistry. But that was eons ago.

And there is the rub.
When results are inconsistent across the user base, it is almost worse than a failure that is consistent.
Of course when inconsistencies result from the differences between different parts of a worldwide distribution system, they are really difficult to solve.

 

[originalwinslow]

@MattKing very interesting history. Photo systems does a great job in terms of fulfillment and are very attentive. They helped me troubleshoot some issues with the LORR replenisher. One time my package arrived before I even made the payment. Ultimately my confusion over the fixer came down to inconsistent information.

In terms of quality control, I did get a bad batch of cinestill-branded ECN-2 developer. They first insisted I had mixed it wrong, but eventually looked into it and found an issue with the manufacturer. Which of course is PS.

 

[mshchem]

One thing is Photo Systems has been doing this forever. Unicolor was huge in the 70's, I used some of their chemistry to develop Ektachrome paper, prints from slides, over 50 years ago. I was always dedicated to Kodak, but Kodak's hobby color chemistry was limited so Unicolor, from Dexter Michigan filled the slot.
The "drift by" printing of color negatives using a plastic tube " drum" in daylight was revolutionary . Kodak required exact temperature control, working in the dark. Unicolor was preheat the drum and chemistry then process in daylight on a counter at room temperature on a roller.
There are Unicubes for determining filtration. Color analyzers and timers (Jingle Bell process timer)
This is the DNA of PSI.

Cinestill and PSI (and maybe Kodak) should publish some basic guidelines for this chemistry, I suspect that they have "plausible denialabilty" if they don't. Still everybody is going to want the real stuff.

Look at how Adox markets photo chemistry.

 

[koraks]

Back to the problem at hand: if this is indeed a fixing problem, @originalwinslow might try re-fixing the film to see if that makes a difference. I'd take that fogged leader strip and dip it halfway into fixer (in a cup/beaker) and leave it there for an hour or so. Then wash and dry the entire strip. If there's a difference between the refixed end and the untreated part, fixing was indeed at least part of the problem. If there's no difference (which I expect...) the problem has to be sought elsewhere, for instance CT/x-ray irradiation. There has been a fairly large batch of x-ray fogged Portra that appeared on the Chinese market ca. 2 years ago; some of it might have found its way to Puerto Rico as well, or the incident may not have been isolated.

 

[mshchem]

One other point roller transport minilabs use the good old two bath fixing procedure. And the tanks are countercurrent flow. The second (last) bath is where fresh replenisher flows, this tank then flows into the first. Just like Ansel Adams did for prints.

I use Jobo so I use, fresh 1 shot then toss for fixer, developer the bleach is replenished and reused. Bleach keeps forever!