[pure-silver] Re: Free Kodak Film


----- Original Message ----- From: "Koch, Gerald" <gkoch02@xxxxxxxxxx>
To: <pure-silver@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
Sent: Tuesday, October 24, 2006 11:13 AM
Subject: [pure-silver] Re: Free Kodak Film


It seems that Kodak solved the Xtol problem when they eliminated the 1
liter package. Now that they have farmed out their chemical production
I wonder how things will be.

Jerry

The problem with the one liter size was a packaging problem. Kodak approached it by increasing the amount of sulfite contained in the small packet. It didn't work. Kodak has since changed the method of packing they use for powder chemistry, both material and method of sealing. However, the 1 liter size of Xtol was not brought back.
The problem generally attributed to Xtol is a short life sudden failure. I've experienced this. The developer works when mixed but may be almost inactive in a couple of weeks without showing any other sign or symptom of a change. This has been reported often enough for me to believe it is fairly common although Kodak denies this. A chemist, Ryuji Suzuki, who has payed some attention to this problem thinks it may have to do with Iron in certain forms in the water. He has devised a formula similar to Xtol that does not seem to suffer from the problem. Unfortunately, Kodak no longer has a real research laboratory but, rather, farms out this work, so there does not appear to be much continuity. I doub't they will ever solve the problem because they consider B&W chemical photography to be a niche market and one which is continuing to shrink (not sure its still shrinking).
Xtol is very good developer... When it works, but is not quite reliable.
For the most part I stick to D-76 1:1 for general work and Microdol-X or Ilford Perceptol for very fine grain work. Too bad.

---
Richard Knoppow
Los Angeles, CA, USA
dickburk@xxxxxxxxxxxxx 

=============================================================================================================
To unsubscribe from this list, go to www.freelists.org and logon to your 
account (the same e-mail address and password you set-up when you subscribed,) 
and unsubscribe from there.

Other related posts: