wet plate and dry plate holders

Hello,

I'm having an issue using the search tool today... I usually find my questions answered in some thread. I was hoping someone could explain to me the difference between wet plate and dry plate holders. I would assume other than wet needing a bit more room to deal with fluid there are other differences? Would I able to shoot a normal dry plates in a wet plate holder?

Thanks for the help.

The wetplate holders are usually one-sided (because you can only do one-at-a-time due to the process) whereas the dry-plate ones are usually two-sided. Yes, you could use a wetplate holder for dry-plates too, assuming the size of the (dry)plate is correct for the wetplate holder.

Filip is making plate holders habartf@gmail.com

Russ

Thanks guys

Wet plate holders often had glass or silver corner supports for the plate, since the silver nitrate eats away at other substances. They also often had to be loaded from the rear. I've seen many dry plate holders for a larger format (5x7 for 4x5) re-purposed by cutting the center divider of the holder out, adding silver wire supports and using the "back" dark slide as a way to get to the plate and the "front" for exposure. I don't know what accommodations would be necessary in using real wet plate holders for dry plates...probably very few.