SOAKING NEGS

"otzi" wrote in message
u...

"Lloyd Erlick" Lloyd at @the-wire. dot com wrote in message
...
On Tue, 29 Aug 2006 20:37:28 +0200, Andrew
Price wrote:

On Tue, 29 Aug 2006 08:13:00 -0400, Lloyd Erlick Lloyd at @the-wire.
dot com wrote:

I have adopted a policy of permitting nothing
to touch the image areas of my photosensitive
materials while they are wet.

At the risk of repeating myself, I still think that the way you put it
in that technical article on your web site:

Drying Screens Get Out of Town If You Know What's Good for You, and
Take Squeegee With You, Too!

is one of the funniest things I've seen in a long time!



August 30, 2006, from Lloyd Erlick,

Thanks! (Repeat yorself all you like ...)

regards,
--le


OK then. -- In lew of distilled water is filtered water OK? If so which
of the following would be most useful?

The charcoal in a plastic container that works fast. _ or the upbeat
ceramic / charcoal device that's a lot slower _ or the more complex multi
filtering layer hi tech wizzmo that I wonder is more geared to baffling
consumers than giving you tasty water.

--
Otzi

On Fri, 1 Sep 2006 09:45:33 +1000, "otzi"
wrote:

hi tech wizzmo that I wonder is more geared to baffling consumers than
giving you tasty water.


August 31, 2006, from Lloyd Erlick,

Well, you've hit it on the head, I think.

Frankly, I don't trust 'filtered' water. Too
many questions about the filter, such as,
when is it no longer working properly and
letting stuff through??

I like the expression 'steam distilled'. I
have a counter top water distilling machine
in my kitchen. It boils and condenses the
water and I've found it close enough to pure
that I've never seen a water spot from it on
my negs.

regards,
--le
________________________________
Lloyd Erlick Portraits, Toronto.
website: www.heylloyd.com
telephone: 416-686-0326
email:
________________________________
--

"Lloyd Erlick" Lloyd at @the-wire. dot com wrote in message
...
On Fri, 1 Sep 2006 09:45:33 +1000, "otzi"
wrote:

hi tech wizzmo that I wonder is more geared to baffling consumers than
giving you tasty water.


August 31, 2006, from Lloyd Erlick,

Well, you've hit it on the head, I think.

Frankly, I don't trust 'filtered' water. Too
many questions about the filter, such as,
when is it no longer working properly and
letting stuff through??

I like the expression 'steam distilled'. I
have a counter top water distilling machine
in my kitchen. It boils and condenses the
water and I've found it close enough to pure
that I've never seen a water spot from it on
my negs.

regards,
--le
________________________________
Lloyd Erlick Portraits, Toronto.
website: www.heylloyd.com
telephone: 416-686-0326
email:
________________________________
--


Can you post a link or two re this device. I am not aware of anything
similar in AU

--
Otzi

On Mon, 4 Sep 2006 12:41:54 +1000, "otzi"
wrote:

.... a counter top water distilling machine
in my kitchen. It boils and condenses the
water and I've found it close enough to pure
that I've never seen a water spot from it on
my negs.

regards,
--le
....
Can you post a link or two re this device. I am not aware of anything
similar in AU

--
Otzi


September 4, 2006, from Lloyd Erlick,

I don't have links handy, but I remember
using Google to search for home kitchen water
distillers. There are many sellers, and
several different machines. The most common
machine is called by one seller the "Love
Distiller". Hmp. But it's the one I have, and
it's the cheapest. (Mine has a label that
says "Ecowater Systems".) It's basically a
cylinder that tapers slightly toward the top.
The bottom has a stainless steel tank
(inside, the outside is painted variously,
white is cheapest) and a heater. The top
(round) lifts off, and contains a fan and
cooling tubes and fins. The outside of the
top has open slots to admit air around the
tubes. The product water comes out a short
spout near the top.

I've used one for over ten years (I'm now on
my second machine; the first provided 6500
liters of product water). I calculate that
the distilled water cost is around twenty
cents a liter, including original cost of
machine, electricity and municipal water. I
prefer it to buying jugs of water at the
store and lugging them home, then deploying
the waste containers somehow. (The cost of
electricity has increased quite dramatically
over the last decade. The machine is rated at
470 watts, and seems to take a little under
eight hours to distill a fill-up of four
liters. I've measured the output, and it is
3.8 liters.) I think of it as a kilowatt-hour
per liter of product water.

None of the added-cost extras they try to
sell are necessary. The special liquid to
clean the interior tank is not needed (use
vinegar, or nothing. I just swill and dump
before filling. A plastic scrubber would be
quite a luxury. The buildup inside tends to
flake off as it builds up, so swilling gets
rid of it. Avoid anything that might scratch
the interior.) The flavor-enhancing filter is
not needed for darkroom water, and if you
want to polish the product water for flavor,
use a common Brita filter. (I find I can
taste the flavour of iron or steel if I drink
the distilled water. No doubt this is from
the machine's tank. After passing through a
Brita, it's fine. Many people claim distilled
water does not taste good; they describe it
as flat. I find it tastes very nice after
going through the Brita; a rest in the
refrigerator is good, too. Pouring the water
back and forth between two containers aerates
it (I think dissolving oxygen in it improves
flavour). Of course, the action of the
distiller as it distills the water (i.e., as
it boils and condenses it, and drips it drop
by drop through the air into its container
....) aerates it quite thoroughly. Anyway, I
like to use the water to drink plain, or for
drinks of all sorts (sure wish I could drink
coffee, I used to love distilled water for
that). It's nice as seltzer, too. Some people
claim distilled water is excessively able to
dissolve substances, and so will rob the body
of vitamins and minerals that are water
soluble. I think this is a maybe-so, but I do
not believe the reasonable alternative is to
drink water out of Lake Ontario. Maybe eating
food that contains vitamins and minerals ...
along with the distilled water ... anyway, my
teeth are in good shape and none of my
internal organs has dissolved. I used to be
five and a half feet tall, now I'm only three
ten, so maybe I've made a mistake ...

regards,
--le
________________________________
Lloyd Erlick Portraits, Toronto.
website: www.heylloyd.com
telephone: 416-686-0326
email:
________________________________
--

Lloyd Erlick wrote (in part):

Frankly, I don't trust 'filtered' water. Too
many questions about the filter, such as,
when is it no longer working properly and
letting stuff through??

Filtering water with a 5 micron filter is what I do for wash water.
An activated charcoal filter may remove some dissolved gasses.

No ordinary filter will remove dissolved salts, such as calcium carbonate.
Perhaps an ion-exchange gizmo will replace some of the "harder" salts with
softer ones (sodium salts), but if you are drying films with water droplets
on them, this is not much better.
I suppose a reverse osmosis filter would be suitable, but distilling the
water is surely the best.
I compromise and use filtered condensate from my dehumidifier for sensitive
solutions, especially PhotoFlo for negatives.

--
.~. Jean-David Beyer Registered Linux User 85642.
/V\ PGP-Key: 9A2FC99A Registered Machine 241939.
/( )\ Shrewsbury, New Jersey http://counter.li.org
^^-^^ 16:55:01 up 1 day, 19:44, 3 users, load average: 4.28, 4.27, 4.21

In article Us0Lg.1383$I71.804@trnddc01,
Jean-David Beyer wrote:

I compromise and use filtered condensate from my dehumidifier for sensitive
solutions, especially PhotoFlo for negatives.

& you don't worry that the condensate may contain algae or worse some
sort fungus?
--
Reality-Is finding that perfect picture
and never looking back.

www.gregblankphoto.com

Greg "_" wrote:
In article Us0Lg.1383$I71.804@trnddc01,
Jean-David Beyer wrote:

I compromise and use filtered condensate from my dehumidifier for sensitive
solutions, especially PhotoFlo for negatives.

& you don't worry that the condensate may contain algae or worse some
sort fungus?

No, I do not worry. This does not mean you are wrong and that I know there
are no algae or fungus. It is just that I filter the condensate and that
should get rid of the big lumps. Also, in 30 years, I have never had a
problem with that.

--
.~. Jean-David Beyer Registered Linux User 85642.
/V\ PGP-Key: 9A2FC99A Registered Machine 241939.
/( )\ Shrewsbury, New Jersey http://counter.li.org
^^-^^ 08:10:01 up 2 days, 10:59, 3 users, load average: 4.28, 4.17, 4.11

On Mon, 04 Sep 2006 20:59:32 GMT, Jean-David
Beyer wrote:

Filtering water with a 5 micron filter is what I do for wash water.
....
I compromise and use filtered condensate from my dehumidifier for sensitive
solutions, especially PhotoFlo for negatives.


September 5, 2006, from Lloyd Erlick,

I'd say filtering wash water is going pretty
far for your negatives! I have the luxury of
municipal water treatment; we all know how
pure and clean city water is, eh?? Shrewsbury
Artesian probably tastes pretty good ...

Dehumidifier water makes great solutions. I
suppose it must have lots of dissolved gases,
and I always had to filter out parts of
insects, but it never left any water spots on
my negs, and that's all I cared about. It
must be cheaper than a distiller, too. Using
dehumidifier water is making use of Mother
Nature's Great Big Water Distiller ...

regards,
--le
________________________________
Lloyd Erlick Portraits, Toronto.
website: www.heylloyd.com
telephone: 416-686-0326
email:
________________________________
--

On Mon, 04 Sep 2006 18:13:10 -0400, "Greg
\"_\"" wrote:

In article Us0Lg.1383$I71.804@trnddc01,
Jean-David Beyer wrote:

I compromise and use filtered condensate from my dehumidifier for sensitive
solutions, especially PhotoFlo for negatives.

& you don't worry that the condensate may contain algae or worse some
sort fungus?


September 5, 2006, from Lloyd Erlick,

That's definitely a concern. However, the
water contains relatively little nutrient
matter, even for micro-organisms. (Filtering
out insect parts is not a major activity.
Actually, once the container is covered, no
bugs get in. They don't provide much food for
algae.) I've had five gallon containers of
dehumidifier water last for years with no
growth or smell. I was always too much the
city boy to actually drink any, but a basic
precaution like boiling it would eliminate
the problem.

I find the worst water for growing nasty
stuff is old tap water. Stored tap water soon
develops an evil smell.

Concerns about algae and the like can be
addressed by boiling, using a few drops of
chlorine bleach (don't use right away for
darkroom solutions ...) or a bit of swimming
pool / humidifier disinfectant.

regards,
--le
________________________________
Lloyd Erlick Portraits, Toronto.
website: www.heylloyd.com
telephone: 416-686-0326
email:
________________________________
--

On Tue, 05 Sep 2006 12:15:16 GMT, Jean-David
Beyer wrote:

Greg "_" wrote:
In article Us0Lg.1383$I71.804@trnddc01,
Jean-David Beyer wrote:

I compromise and use filtered condensate from my dehumidifier for sensitive
solutions, especially PhotoFlo for negatives.

& you don't worry that the condensate may contain algae or worse some
sort fungus?

No, I do not worry. This does not mean you are wrong and that I know there
are no algae or fungus. It is just that I filter the condensate and that
should get rid of the big lumps. Also, in 30 years, I have never had a
problem with that.



September 5, 2006, from Lloyd Erlick,

But Greg's point may be that micro-organisms
or spores are introduced into your
photosensitive materials, to lie in wait for
the great day of reproduction and feasting
upon gelatin, leaving your tiny particles of
silver unsupported ...

However, conditions suitable for this type of
degradation of stored photo materials are
warm and moist. If negs are archived in too
much warmth and moisture (humidity, that is)
it doesn't much matter if the wash water had
a few bacteria or spores. That might
accelerate the process, but poor archive
conditions will activate bugs passing by,
irrespective of our wash water.

regards,
--le
________________________________
Lloyd Erlick Portraits, Toronto.
website: www.heylloyd.com
telephone: 416-686-0326
email:
________________________________
--