Greetings from Slovenia. I have been reading pure-silver archives for quite
some years now and I never cease to be amazed by the wealth of knowledge
available over there.
As for me, I've developing film since I was 15, which is over 25 years now,
setting up my first darkroom in the bathroom when I was 17, now having a
permanent one in the basement of my house. For the last 5 years or so I've
been practicing LF (4x5) photography as well which meant I had to source
out an appropriate enlarger. I was lucky enough to find a mint Durst
locally from a private seller. It sits happily next to my Kaiser which can
only go up to 6x6.
Recently I have been playing with the idea of using powdered chemicals
only. Developer is of no concern to me, however fixer is another matter (so
they say!). Fot too many times a message came across from many experts and
"experts" advocating that with today's materials ammonium based fixer is a
must and that sodium fixer can produce less than permanent images. Is that
really the case? Kodak, Foma, Tetenal (as well as Formulary, etc) offer
such without reservations. I would really like to know if anyone has tested
modern papers fixed with sodium fixer for residual silver?
Cheers! Miha