Fixer life and a Tri-X question

[javimm]

Hi. I have some 400 ml of Ilford Rapid Fixer diluted to 1+9 almost air tight that I made in July. I have used it for fixing 6 rolls of film since I made it. How long can I expect it to last, timewise and numer of film wise?.
In the original Ilford bottle, it says that it should last one month, but everytime I develop I do the strip-test, and te strip of film clears in about a minute, the same time since I made it from concentrated Fixer in July.
When can I say it's exhausted or has gone bad due to its age?. I don't know if the strip test is enough to be sure it will work well and won't fix my negs properly.

Yesterday, I developed a roll of Tri-x, and it has a slight purple tint to it. The first roll I developed didn't. I have it in front of me and it's completely gray, but the last one is slightly purple and the roll before this last one is a bit purple too. The negs looks good though. The film is dated to 2009, so it's not the problem. Maybe it's the Fixer I talked about earlier?. I'm using HC-110 dil B, stop bath with water, same washing regime for all my rolls.

Thanks,
Javier.

 

[tedwhite]

The most certain way to tell if your fixer is getting exhausted is to have a bottle of hypocheck on hand. Put a few drops into a small glass container containing your fixer. If the drops turn cloudy - as if you had put a drop or two of milk into a glass of water - then the fixer is no good.

If the drops of hypocheck just disappear - as if you had put a drop or two of water into a vial of water - then the fixer is OK.

Hope this helps.

Ted

 

[javimm]

Thanks for the quick answer but... ahem... forgive my ignorance, what's a "hypocheck"?. Is it some kind of chemical you can buy in a photo store?.

 

[shenkerian]

You can also drop a film leader into the fixer and time how long it takes to become clear. Fix for twice that time to be safe.

I do this as part of my development process - I drop the leader into the fixer as I wash the film for a stop bath.

 

[alexz]

Why not just run a quick film leader test ? Just drop the cut off leader (fully exposed, of course) into fixer working solution and see how fast it turns completely clear. Then just double that time for your actual fix. If you see however, that the leader isn't getting cleared during a reasonable time - this is about the right time to make a fresh fixer solution...

 

[MichaelW]

You can also get some paper strips that test the fix. I've seen it done at several facilities & it is very accurate. Think it might be a ph test. You can probably buy it from freestyle or similar darkroom supply houses. Only takes a second or two for the result.

 

[kully]

Javier has already said he does the strip test.

Javier, I've used a 1.5 litre mix of that Ilford fixer this summer which was 2 months old and had >30 rolls through it with not problems (we'll see in a length of time when the negatives have no image though 🙂 ). I chucked it after that, even though a further strip test when it was 3.5 months old showed it still seemed fine.

I can't beleive the money I wasted when I used the fixer only once and chucked it away...

 

[javimm]

About the leader test. That's what I do. Sorry if I explained it wrong in my original post. I called it a strip-test. I should have said a leader test. Sorry.

The leader clears in about a minute (I can see through it. It has a purple tonality, but it's completely transparent after one minute. I fix for 3:30 minutes.

 

[drewbarb]

Thanks for the quick answer but... ahem... forgive my ignorance, what's a "hypocheck"?. Is it some kind of chemical you can buy in a photo store?.

Yes, you can get hypocheck at most good photo shops. It tests fix for exhaustion due to silver saturation. I'm not sure if it works for film fix, though. It should, but I've noticed that mine still doesn't go milky in film fix which I know to be exhausted. I use if for paper fixe, and it's very reliable. For film, I keep track of the amount of fim run, and keep an eye on the fix performance. When I reach the recommended film capacity for the volume of fix I'm using, I recycle it, unless it's still fixing my film at the original time. When it slows, I might extend the fix time, or I might recycle it, depending upon how much film has gone through it.

Tri-X is known to need more fixing time to clear, especially since they changed the base a few years ago. Just extend your fix time by a minute or two. If you need to extend your fix time by more than 50% over using fresh fix, it's time to recycle it and start fresh. Another way to keep an eye on your fix it is to keep doing the film clearing check and change it out when the clearing time has extended to 150% of the time needed with fresh fix.

 

[MartinP]

I just checked my bottle of rapid-Fix and it says only that working-solution in a tray will last seven days. In the full product data sheet (see the Ilford website here), it mentions that in a sealed container the diluted solution should last one month. With an old, and rather small, volume of fixer you could also expect to have problems with the solution becoming less acid, especially if you don't use an acid stop-bath.

The quoted capacity of the recommended film dilution (1:4) is 24 rolls of 135/120 per litre. It "could" be possible to use fixer made at the dilution for paper (1:9, as you have done) if you check the clearing time of the film you are using and then double it. One might guess at maybe ten rolls per litre in that case, when using fresh solution. Taken together with the age of the solution I'd definitely say don't risk it - even if the clearing time on a few square cm of film seems ok, it could be on the edge of being safe by this time.

I'm wondering if there is another set of data that you have seen somewhere which gives different figures to the Rapid-Fixer data-sheet ? Possibly you have seen figures for deep-tank use, which utilises a replenishment method within a much higher volume of solution, and also requires monitoring of the pH over it's lifetime.

 

[Pherdinand]

don't apologize. Some people have no patience to read the text what we write. Unbelievable.
I think as long as the test shows consistent short time,s it should be fine. If it goes over 3 minutes to clear, things start to go downhill. It would mean you need to fix it for 6 minutes or more, and that is not recommended by the companies making the chemistry already.

 

[javimm]

Thanks all for the useful answers (as usual in this forum 🙂 ). I made a typo in my original post. The solution I'm using is diluted 1+4, not 1+9 as I said. I didn't remember how much I diluted it so the 1+9 figure was on my mind. Rechecking my papers, I did dilute it to 1+4, as Ilford says, so everything is correct in that aspect.
The time is consistent through the 6 rolls, 1 minute leader clearence for all of them, so I use 3:30-3:45 minutes, 3.5 times the clearing time. I'll throw it away when the time starts to grow. I still have 900 ml of the original Ilford bottle, air tight sealed using marbles.

How about the purple tint I mentioned for Tri-x?

Thanks,
Javier.

 

[Pherdinand]

i had the same question some time ago and i was told not to worry about🙂
or if i do, that a few days of daylight will take it out of the film.

So i don't worry.

It's stg with the film base and anti halation layer.

 

[drewbarb]

How about the purple tint I mentioned for Tri-x?

Thanks,
Javier.

Re-read my post. Tri-X has a new base in the last few years- it's now the same base as T-Max films. These films all need at least 5 minutes to completely clear. I use 6 minutes with fix that's still good but no longer really fresh. I also use a Perma-wash (fix, two minutes wash with water, three minutes in Perma-wash, with some agitation, then final wash) which will help remove the pink/purple stain, but even with the long fix time and the Perma-wash, they still stay a little purple. It's annoying.

 

[shenkerian]

Hi Javimm, sorry for misreading your initial post. I tend to trust the strip test for myself, but it looks like others have given you plenty of other tests.

I've found the purple tint fades to grey after it completely dries, but you're definitely not alone in noticing it. You can see it was troubling pnet users back in 2003:
http://photo.net/bboard/q-and-a-fetch-msg?msg_id=004gGU

 

[javimm]

Re-read my post. Tri-X has a new base in the last few years- it's now the same base as T-Max films. These films all need at least 5 minutes to completely clear. I use 6 minutes with fix that's still good but no longer really fresh. I also use a Perma-wash (fix, two minutes wash with water, three minutes in Perma-wash, with some agitation, then final wash) which will help remove the pink/purple stain, but even with the long fix time and the Perma-wash, they still stay a little purple. It's annoying.

I did reread it, but couldn't find an answer for the purple tint thing. Anyway, I'll fix for 5-6 min the next time, just in case I'm underfixing.

I don't remember if the first roll turned gray with time. Maybe it's like that. I don't mind the purple tint. I was afraid that I did something wrong in the develop-fixing process.

Cheers,
Javier.

 

[drewbarb]

Tri-X is known to need more fixing time to clear, especially since they changed the base a few years ago. Just extend your fix time by a minute or two.

Sorry- this was what I was refering to, but I did not specifically mention this in reference to the purple base problem. Anyway, good luck.

 

[brandonjscott]

Javier,

I'm not sure how you're washing your film, but I've found that if I extend my wash time, the puple/pink tint washes out. I use the Ilford washing method (a series of inversions using clean water) and continue the process until the water coming out of the developing tank is no long purplish.

Brandon

 

[javimm]

Brandon, I use the Ilford method too. The first wash water is slightly purple too, but not the last. I do a sequence of 5-10-20-10 inversions.

 

[Tim Gray]

Tri-X will always be a little purple. My T-Max (TMZ) negs actually come out grayer when I finish with them. Its just the color of the support - don't worry about it.