How do you store your chemistry?

[400bpm]

Looking for good recommendations for storing developer, fixer, and other chemistry. Cheap and readily available containers preferred.<p>

 

I'm starting to get a little neurotic about storing my chemistry. It used to be unnecessary; I'd just mix up some one-shot HC-110:B from the bottle and fix it with whatever fixer I had stored in a half-gallon milk jug. Now I employ a half-dozen developers, all different ages, in various stages of oxidation, and in different containers. <b>D-19</b> in a graying gallon milk jug, <b>Acufine</b> in a graying plastic 1L Jobo bottle, <b>Diafine</b> in a myriad of glass bottles, <b>D-76</b> and <b>Flexicolor</b> developers in a collapsable black plastic containers, you get the idea.<p>

 

Something inside me wants to organize and unify this, and I think that getting insight from this forum, seeing how <i>you</i> store your chemistry, just might help.<p>

 

ps. what causes these plastic bottles that I store developer in to go gray? It seems to be some sort of silver precipitate that can be mostly wiped away.

[john_finch]

Hi Brian

FWIW I decant my developers off into small (100ml) brown glass bottles filled right to the top. This keeps the air out and keeps in tip top shape. All the bottles are carefully marked and kept in a fridge in the darkroom.

Hope this helps :)

[richard_cochran]

Decanting into individual containers as suggested will probably work

for most chemicals, but be careful. Part of the key to Rodinal's

long shelf life is the fact that the concentrate is a

saturated solution, with crystaline matter in the bottom of the

bottle. If you decant some of the liquid out without getting

a corresponding proportion of the crystals, the shelf

life will be much reduced. I know you didn't mention using

Rodinal, and I suspect few, if any, other

developers have this quirk, but I thought it worth mentioning

lest someone else decant his Rodinal into multiple small containers.

[ruben_bittermann]

Coca Cola (or similar) plastic bottles, of the size of your convenience (Myself: 2 litres), which are contractable, and replaceable any time.

 

I have been using them for B&W developers, fixers, toners since more than 5 years. They never broke and are easy to clean. Since I write over them, I throw them by choice.

 

As for shading them from light: I use the black plastic bags that come wrapping the printing paper (inside the boxes).

[400bpm]

I forgot to also inquire how best to clean one's storage containers.<p>

 

Let's say I have a nice glass liquor bottle that I'd like to store some developer in. What's a good way to clean it?

[lyle_gordon]

I use small glass bottles for storing HC-110 and for most things i just use the container they came in as I use mostly liquid chems.

[al_kaplan1]

I also use soda bottles. I used to use plastic bleach jugs for years, but they started cracking from age. The soda bottles are really air tight! They're designed to withstand the pressure of the carbonization! I divide gallon mixes into several 1 or 2 liter bottles, all but one filled to the brim. The partially filled bottle is the one I start using.

[lex_jenkins]

I tend to mix up fairly small batches at a time, usually around 500ml. Arizona Iced Tea bottles are handy - one favorite flavor comes in blue glass, another with a sturdy green plastic wrapper around the clear glass. Those, and my brown plastic jugs, sit in corners in the cramped "darkroom" (spare bathroom/laundry room).

 

When I must resort to clear containers I keep 'em in cabinet under the sink. Reportedly some chemistry degrades under exposure to light, even ordinary artificial room light. Dunno whether this really occurs.

 

I use masking tape labels and leave room for tick marks to keep track of when the chemistry was mixed and how many times used.

 

Liquid concentrates (Rodinal, Ilfosol-S, Hypam fixer, etc.), I leave in the original containers. Generally I buy in small batches and try to use it up as quickly as possible.

[lex_jenkins]

Almost forgot...

 

There's a relatively new development in fermented malt beverage storage technology (beer, to you heathens). Double-walled plastic bottles. Miller Lite in "Stay Cold" bottles have this.

 

While the double thick bottle is no big deal for photo chemistry storage there are two advantages: brown plastic; wide mouth with good quality resealable cap.

 

Downside? This particular bottle holds only 473ml, slightly shy of perfect for small storage but pretty close.

[frank.schifano]

Used soda bottles, that's the way to go. They work as well as anything else and it's cheaper to buy seltzer water in 1L bottles and throw the seltzer away than to buy any sort of bottle.

[richard_urmonas]

I use an range of small brown glass bottles. My experience has been that glass bottles give better storage life than plastic. I use labels made from short legths of masking tape. The bottles are cheap.

A 100ml one runs around US$0.50, a 1 litre is under US$2. The best

place I found to get them was from an essential oil / aromatherapy

place.

 

For cleaning I use a good bottle brush and some sugar soap, then rinse

and rinse, and rinse.

 

I have never seen crystals in Rodinal. I buy mine from a high turnover place so it is always fresh. I split up a 500mL bottle

into 5 100mL bottles and find it keeps very well that way.

[jennifer_thomas]

Hi,

I got 10oz club soda bottles. Clear glass is nice to see how the chemicals are doing, and you can tell if it's clean after washing. Just keep them under a cabinet, or in a box. Three 10oz filled to the top hold a quart. I went to a small, local soda company to buy caps, and the nice guy there gave them to me. I got over 400 caps. Heinz vinegar bottles are nice, but some had a residue inside for some reason from the vinegar. It's all gone now, I put in a couple of ounces of formula 409 cleaner, and gave them a good shaking a couple of times a day for weeks.

 

 

Jennifer

[nicholas_t.]

Brown glass bottles for developer, ancient photographic types - excellent.<p>

BTW there was quite a funny <a href="http://groups.google.co.nz/groups?hl=en&lr=&ie=UTF-8&threadm=3e43ce1e.137517428%40news.the-wire.com&rnum=3&prev=/groups%3Fq%3Ddarkroom%2Bbulk%2Bbuying%2Bphoto%2Bchemicals%26hl%3Den%26lr%3D%26ie%3DUTF-8%26selm%3D3e43ce1e.137517428%2540news.the-wire.com%26rnum%3D3">thread</a> (dunno if this link will work) running in the rec.darkrooom newsgroup on google some time back. About buying bulk photo chems mainly, but it made me laugh. By chance, I was outside my motorcycle mechanics and noticed that the out the back of a cafe were a heap of detergent bottles of all sizes. I nabbed them (not stealing they were going to go to the dump/recyclers) and use them to store fixer in.<p>

Another BTW, those concertina bottles sold in photo are quite bad for oxidation. Apparently, oxygen bubbles hide in the folds and the chems oxygenate quite badly.<p>

*disclaimer* this is possible heresy and to be taken as such. No experiments have been undertaken to prove such statements by author ;^))

[chris_waller]

I use 2 litre plastic domestic bleach bottles. They're dense

plastic, fairly wide-necked and have child-proof caps. I store

print dev, stop and fix in these. They would be fine for storing

certain film dev stock solutions (e.g. ID11), but as a Rodinal user

this isn't an issue for me.

[thom_jorgensen]

I am a photo newbie, but my other hobby is brewing wine and mead so I know something about bottles!

If you want liter sized glass bottles that really seal and don't need capping, you can get flip top (Grolsch style) beer bottles at www.homebrewheaven.com

 

Actually thinking about it, you could also use the small necked carboys and demi john's in a variety of sizes between one and fourteen gallons.

[ole_tjugen]

I confess to buying Nalgene bottles especially for storing chemicals. Every bottle is labelled with what's in it, and I use sizes from 100ml to 2l. Since these are made for storing chemicals, I assume they're good. Experience also shows that they're good, my final 10ml of Pyrocat-HD was still clear after 3 months in a 100ml bottle.

 

BTW, I would expect the gray residue to be tar, not silver. It's caused by reduction of the developer...

[jim_appleyard]

Try to stay away from plastic bottles as they allow oxygen to pass through. I buy V-8 in the glass bottles at the grocery store (about 1 liter) and use those with glass marbles to take up the air space. Your chemistry will last longer this way.

[andre_noble4]

Hinge Stoppered Fischer Beer Bottle<div></div>