DIY print washer

I have been using a Kodak siphon to wash my prints (RC) but I am going to
start printing fiber and would like to build my own print washer. I never
print more than 2 final prints in a session and therefore do not need one of
the commercial washers capable of washing many prints at a time. Now, I
have never seen commercial print washers in person and they are at best
special order items at my local photo stores (no demo models). I print
11x14 but envision a thin Plexiglas tank for 16x20 with 2 or 3 dividers
(capable of 3 or 4 prints respectively), here is my first question: Should
the dividers be solid (thinner Plexiglas perhaps) and if so, should they be
made out of a material that has texture? The other question I have is about
where to locate the water inlet and outlet, meaning inlet at the bottom and
outlet at the top of the tank or vice versa?

Any answers, suggestions welcomed.

Guillermo

Kudos for your Yankee values (couldn't resist). Anyway, go look up print
washers on commercial sites like Adorama, B&H and also look up print washers
on eBay. One guy is making them out of utility wash trays from home depot.

But the pics will give you some ideas.

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http://cgi6.ebay.com/aw-cgi/eBayISAP...ems&userid=dsc
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"f/256" wrote in message
ble.rogers.com...
I have been using a Kodak siphon to wash my prints (RC) but I am going to
start printing fiber and would like to build my own print washer. I never
print more than 2 final prints in a session and therefore do not need one
of
the commercial washers capable of washing many prints at a time. Now, I
have never seen commercial print washers in person and they are at best
special order items at my local photo stores (no demo models). I print
11x14 but envision a thin Plexiglas tank for 16x20 with 2 or 3 dividers
(capable of 3 or 4 prints respectively), here is my first question: Should
the dividers be solid (thinner Plexiglas perhaps) and if so, should they
be
made out of a material that has texture? The other question I have is
about
where to locate the water inlet and outlet, meaning inlet at the bottom
and
outlet at the top of the tank or vice versa?

Any answers, suggestions welcomed.

Guillermo

On Thu, 05 Feb 2004 00:55:55 GMT, "f/256" wrote:



Any answers, suggestions welcomed.

Guillermo

Guillermo

IIRC - somebody did a bunch of testing of archival wash methods back
in the early 80s (David Vestal?) - in any event, what struck me out of
the reams of data was that it seemed as though a simple wash, followed
by soaking in clean water overnight, followed by another short, simple
wash beat out virtually any other method - and it's cheap and easy.

On Thu, 05 Feb 2004 00:55:55 GMT, "f/256" wrote:

I have been using a Kodak siphon to wash my prints (RC) but I am going to
start printing fiber and would like to build my own print washer. I never
print more than 2 final prints in a session and therefore do not need one of
the commercial washers capable of washing many prints at a time. Now, I
have never seen commercial print washers in person and they are at best
special order items at my local photo stores (no demo models). I print
11x14 but envision a thin Plexiglas tank for 16x20 with 2 or 3 dividers
(capable of 3 or 4 prints respectively), here is my first question: Should
the dividers be solid (thinner Plexiglas perhaps) and if so, should they be
made out of a material that has texture? The other question I have is about
where to locate the water inlet and outlet, meaning inlet at the bottom and
outlet at the top of the tank or vice versa?

Any answers, suggestions welcomed.

Guillermo



feb504 from Lloyd Erlick,

I'd say the first question would be do you want to be able to use it
unattended, or is it all right if you have to go and fiddle with it
every so often.

If you don't mind going to the device and tweaking it every ten or
fifteen minutes, I'd say just make a tank with your desired number of
dividers (I'd use mesh or surgical tubing to separate prints, I don't
really believe solid partitions create truly separated compartments).
Provide a convenient method of emptying it, and when using it (i.e. it
contains prints), simply fill with water, wait ten minutes while it
soaks, empty, refill, and perform this ritual to your heart's content.

Making a washer that you can just trickle water into and expect it to
drain all right and wash the print as well gets you into worries that
certain parts of the print do not recieve effective changes of water
due to irregular circulation. You'd have to check your prints. A lot
of research. Fill and dump sidesteps this issue because it's obvious
the print is completely exposed to the fresh inputs of water,
irrespective of eddies or currents or vortexes or anything at all.

The attended dump and refill method is the old standby done in trays.
A tank is just a tray standing on its edge, with another side added.

If you use the single-tray method of FB print processing, you could
just devote one tray to each print, and let them wash in their trays,
by fill and dump. This would be a pretty cheap way to do it, especialy
if you have too many trays kicking around from accumulating stuff over
the years. (A friend of mine just gave me all his trays after he
decided to drop the wet darkroom for digital. I don't need them any
more than he does!)

I've always thought fill and dump could be accomplished very easily
unattended by employing the type of valve used in toilets. A toilet is
a fill and dump device.

I think commercial print washers are very overpriced. They're in
competition with fish tanks sold at yard sales, and bound to come off
second best in the price department. Once you've got the tank, though,
the rest should not be all that costly.

regards,
--le
_______________________________________
Lloyd Erlick Portraits,
2219 Gerrard Street East, unit #1,
Toronto M4E 2C8 Canada.
---
voice 416-686-0326

http://www.heylloyd.com
_______________________________________

I use a homemade print washer I made years ago. I took the design out of a
photo magazine that has long since been tossed. I can briefly describe it
because it is not complicated at all.
The shell is a 13-gallon plastic trash can. Inside I have 10-12 sheets
of thin Plexiglas glued into for evenly slotted pieces of PVC pipe to hold
the prints. The exit is a PVC screwed-in angle at the bottom about 1/2 to
3/4 inch in diameter (without looking) that has clear plastic tubing glued
into it and rises upward toward the top of the trash can (or print washer
now). This allows the water to be held in the print washer up to the level
of the top of the external hose/tube. I then have a shower head attachment
with a flexible hose that I clip on top of the washer that sprays water
across the prints. Works fairly well except that the top of the trash can
needs to be reinforced because the weight of the water causes it to expand.
Very cheap to build! If you would like more information, I'll look abit
closer and try to give a better description to give you ideas on how to
build your own.

If you do a Google search on this wash method, several people have
discredited this approach.

IIRC - somebody did a bunch of testing of archival wash methods back
in the early 80s (David Vestal?) - in any event, what struck me out of
the reams of data was that it seemed as though a simple wash, followed
by soaking in clean water overnight, followed by another short, simple
wash beat out virtually any other method - and it's cheap and easy.

"M&M" wrote in message
...
If you do a Google search on this wash method, several people have
discredited this approach.

IIRC - somebody did a bunch of testing of archival wash methods back
in the early 80s (David Vestal?) - in any event, what struck me out of
the reams of data was that it seemed as though a simple wash, followed
by soaking in clean water overnight, followed by another short, simple
wash beat out virtually any other method - and it's cheap and easy.

too good to be true...

Guillermo

wrote in message
...
On Thu, 05 Feb 2004 00:55:55 GMT, "f/256" wrote:

feb504 from Lloyd Erlick,

If you don't mind going to the device and tweaking it every ten or
fifteen minutes, I'd say just make a tank with your desired number of
dividers (I'd use mesh or surgical tubing to separate prints, I don't
really believe solid partitions create truly separated compartments).
Provide a convenient method of emptying it, and when using it (i.e. it
contains prints), simply fill with water, wait ten minutes while it
soaks, empty, refill, and perform this ritual to your heart's content.

Maybe I should try this method first, I guess I could even get away with
trays instead of building a tank, one print in each tray, changing water
every 10 minutes. Would six changes be enough?

Guillermo

"Robert J. Mathes" wrote in message
...
I use a homemade print washer I made years ago. I took the design out of a
photo magazine that has long since been tossed. I can briefly describe it
because it is not complicated at all.
The shell is a 13-gallon plastic trash can. Inside I have 10-12 sheets
of thin Plexiglas glued into for evenly slotted pieces of PVC pipe to hold
the prints. The exit is a PVC screwed-in angle at the bottom about 1/2 to
3/4 inch in diameter (without looking) that has clear plastic tubing glued
into it and rises upward toward the top of the trash can (or print washer
now). This allows the water to be held in the print washer up to the level
of the top of the external hose/tube. I then have a shower head attachment
with a flexible hose that I clip on top of the washer that sprays water
across the prints. Works fairly well except that the top of the trash can
needs to be reinforced because the weight of the water causes it to
expand.
Very cheap to build! If you would like more information, I'll look abit
closer and try to give a better description to give you ideas on how to
build your own.

I found this site http://www.peter-bryenton.co.uk/bpw/index.html probably
similar idea to yours (minus the drying rack instead of Plexiglas dividers).
Problem is that it would waste too much water, I only print 2, perhaps 3
final prints per session.

Guillermo

On Fri, 06 Feb 2004 04:21:40 GMT, "f/256"
wrote:


wrote in message
.. .
On Thu, 05 Feb 2004 00:55:55 GMT, "f/256" wrote:

feb504 from Lloyd Erlick,

If you don't mind going to the device and tweaking it every ten or
fifteen minutes, I'd say just make a tank with your desired number of
dividers (I'd use mesh or surgical tubing to separate prints, I don't
really believe solid partitions create truly separated compartments).
Provide a convenient method of emptying it, and when using it (i.e. it
contains prints), simply fill with water, wait ten minutes while it
soaks, empty, refill, and perform this ritual to your heart's content.

Maybe I should try this method first, I guess I could even get away with
trays instead of building a tank, one print in each tray, changing water
every 10 minutes. Would six changes be enough?

Guillermo



feb604 from Lloyd Erlick,

There's no doubt you could get away with trays;
it's been done for millenia. Thousands of
centuries of darkroom workers have used their
stone trays to wash prints...

I'd say six changes of water would be fine. Kodak
says (sorry I can't cite a specific reference, but
I've seen it countless times) five changes of
water are enough. They might be referring to film,
a bit of searching through Kodak's material might
be in order. But still, I'd say that six changes
(after using a hypo clear bath) including ten or
fifteen minutes soaking between changes, would do
a good job. Make sure the prints don't just sink
and stick closely to the bottom. Maybe put a bit
of plastic screen material in the tray so the
paper is kept off the botom.

The only advantage of commercial print washers is
the ability to ignore them for the duration of the
wash. The attended wash is actually superior in
terms of washing; it's very attention-intensive,
though, since you have to keep coming back and
sloshing the tray and making sure the prints are
not floating part way out into the air. But if one
is willing to do that (it's not so difficult!) one
can save a lot of money.

Basically FB material washes by diffusion of the
undesirable molecules out of the paper and
emulsion into the surrounding water. Diffusion
slows as the molecules collect in the surrounding
water, so it must be dumped and replaced. After
enough of this, the number of molecules in the
paper is reduced to the point where inducing more
to leave is very difficult, or even to the point
where no more molecules are actually present. This
concept does not imply that one must have a
commercial print washer, or spend money at all. It
only implies the sheet of paper must be allowed to
give up what we regard as contaminating molecules
in the only way it can, which is slowly by
diffusion.

To tell you the truth, I think it might be a
better use of time and resources to just forget
about tanks and special construction projects and
stick with producing beautiful prints. The project
takes up time and money that could go into paper
and darkroom activities. Plus there is the time
and effort of earning the money; time away from
the darkroom is bad for your mental health. Use
the old traditional methods and stay sane...

Another thought: what with so many people
abandoning the traditional darkroom, you'd think
there would be great big boxy plastic tank style
print washers available for cheap. We've seen the
price of 10x10 horizontal enlargers lately (under
200 bucks!). Washers must be out there, too.

regards,
--le
_______________________________________
Lloyd Erlick Portraits,
2219 Gerrard Street East, unit #1,
Toronto M4E 2C8 Canada.
---
voice 416-686-0326

http://www.heylloyd.com
_______________________________________