water temperature

Does anyone know of a device, or a control mechanism that will keep the water temperature constant?

Yes, you can use a film processor like the Jobo CPE-2. There are a multitude of industrial temperature controllers, Julabo being one that I know of, but they are very expensive. Another possibility is to look in the aquarium trade - there are chiller/heater combo's for marine fish etc. In case of the latter, you will have to set up a water bath with overflow or something similar. It is much simpler to only heat, than to control precisely at a point that may be either side of ambient depending on the season and time of day. For that reason, colour film at 38 deg C in winter is easier to control than b/w at 16 dec C on a balmy day.

Huck said:

Does anyone know of a device, or a control mechanism that will keep the water temperature constant?

Click to expand...

I'm working on a device to do this. If you might be interested, please PM me.

If you use an aquarium heater you will also need some sort of a pump to keep the water moving around the heater and the tanks or the system will not produce uniform temperatures. In the past I have used a replacement pump for a humidifier unit. Designed to work in water there is no shock hazard.

Even though they are very expensive options, these need to be included for future member searches. I own the K250 and it's one of the best investments I ever made in darkroom equipment.

Intellifaucet D250

Intellifaucet K250

Ken

The Intellifaucet is the deal. You will need both a hot and cold water supply. In my home the cold water isn't really wold, especially in the summer time, so I also have a chiller. Bill Barber

Here in the Pacific Northwest my ambient cold water temperature approaches, but never rises above, 68F. So it works out great. While building out the darkroom I did chart the cold temps for a full year, just to make sure the Intellifaucet was advisable.

The Intellifaucet is such a precision instrument that even with my cold water temp hovering right at 67F, it still works flawlessly when set to 68F. Pretty impressive.

Ken

this is the Leedal set up listed ant B and H as O/S. Hot and cold in, filter, and mixing valve. Auction sites have them time to time. I bought mine for $75 last year.

Huck said:

Does anyone know of a device, or a control mechanism that will keep the water temperature constant?

Click to expand...

All Jobo processors and TBE (tempering baths) will do exactly that.

A Phototherm Model 14 bath unit works really well. They are discontinued but pop up here and there.

The Phototherm Sidekick processors are still being made, and will control the water temperature as well.

Ken Nadvornick said:

Even though they are very expensive options, these need to be included for future member searches. I own the K250 and it's one of the best investments I ever made in darkroom equipment.

Intellifaucet D250

Intellifaucet K250

Ken

Click to expand...

Ken

I like to thank you very much. I live in S. Cal, and the water here during summer goes over 80F. Can I connect an Intellifaucet just to the cold water? Or can I connect the device to a water tank, and get the temperature I need?

Huck said:

Ken

I like to thank you very much. I live in S. Cal, and the water here during summer goes over 80F. Can I connect an Intellifaucet just to the cold water? Or can I connect the device to a water tank, and get the temperature I need?

Click to expand...

The itellifaicets are just mixing valves. They do not actually temper the water in any way.

Huck said:

I live in S. Cal, and the water here during summer goes over 80F. Can I connect an Intellifaucet just to the cold water? Or can I connect the device to a water tank, and get the temperature I need?

Click to expand...

Most of the answers so far have been about mixing cold and hot water to get a desired temperature (mixing valve) or heating cold water in a tempering bath (Jobo, Phototherm). However, it looks as though you are trying to cool your "cold" water, which is a different problem. Is that correct?

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

Not everyone lives in SoCal or Texas.

Huck said:

Does anyone know of a device, or a control mechanism that will keep the water temperature constant?

Click to expand...

Having chickened out of doing colour myself I only have monochrome temperatures to worry about (20 deg. C) so I set the room temperature to 20 dg. C, run the water into a row of measuring cylinders at 20 and they stay that way through the whole session. I only run the taps before and after the session using the row of cylinders for the processing.

RR

Huck said:

Ken

I like to thank you very much. I live in S. Cal, and the water here during summer goes over 80F. Can I connect an Intellifaucet just to the cold water? Or can I connect the device to a water tank, and get the temperature I need?

Click to expand...

Sadly, no. As mentioned above, the Intellifaucets are strictly mixing valves. They require already existing hot and cold water lines, then use software algorithms to activate solenoid-driven valves to precisely control water temperature by adjusting flows in real time.

This means that the unit cannot supply a water temperature colder than your ambient cold water flow. Or hotter than your ambient hot water flow.

The software is even sophisticated enough to automatically compensate for the initial spurt of untempered (hot or cold) water produced when the Start button is first pressed. It seems to use an attenuation function to do this. A very elegant solution.

Didn't know you were located in Southern California. I was born in North Hollywood, raised in Norwalk, and had a nice dedicated darkroom in Anaheim. I am well aware of your struggles with 80F "cold" water supplies. I settled on large water baths with a jug of ice water nearby for tempering. But of course this doesn't help with running water washes.

My solution to the problem was a move to the Pacific Northwest. I don't know if ambient cold ever drops to 68F or below where you are located. But if it does, it's probably not for more than a few weeks in winter. Not really enough to justify the cost of one of these guys.

Ken

Huck, I live in South Africa, so I have much the same problem as you. Our ambient water can run at >30 deg C in summer. Mixing valves can only attain a temperature that is in between the temperatures of your cold and hot water supplies. To get colder than ambient, one usually requires a chiller unit, but there are work-arounds. One can, for instance, pump water through a coiled copper tube that is immersed in an ice bucket, and use that as the cold supply to the Intellifaucet. Unfortunately, that still leaves you with yet another expense. The best best in your case is to look for a film processor with built-in chiller, such as the CPE-2. The CPA-2 is strictly for colour film processing and has only heating. Because the developing has to be done at 38 deg C, it is hardly ever necessary to cool down the bath, so a chiller is not necessary in that case. I suppose one can make a temperature controlled bath from a pretty simple setup: Thermocouple, PID controller (or two-way switch), heating element, fridge refrigeration unit, pump and of course the bath itself. Adding all those up, you'll end up paying more than a used film processor, I think.

Can someone help me here:
I am building a darkroom (one of my lifelong dreams!) and am looking for a temperature control solution as well. I am building my water panel from scratch and can find all the parts except a thermostatic mixing valve that can facilitate low temperatures. My cold water is 60 degrees and of course I want to be able to raise and maintain it to 70, but all of the mixing valves I can find are designed to come off of hot water heaters and will only come down to about 85. So, what are Delta, Arkay and Leedal using??? I cant seem to find it and think I may be barking up the wrong trees.

I have everything else (filters, flowmeter, thermometer, etc...) and just need the mixing valve itself. Any help is appreciated!