Storing Chemicals

[Pepe]

How do you store yours ? The (expensive) specially made Photochemical containers, dark glass bottles or milk jugs or something in between ?

Why do I ask ? Well I can only buy big 0.5-2 liter or bigger accordeon bottles locally, and I think they are expensive. I can find cheaper online, but shipping plays there.

Now I read many of you use milk bottles, but on other sites I also read reports of people whose developers dissolved the bottles.

So... what can I use for my one-liter / quart solutions ?

I didn't want to make it a poll though 😀

 

[markinlondon]

Most accordeon bottles are made of LDPE and are thus quite gas permeable. PET bottles (the kind fizzy drinks are sold in) are much better and are easily squeezed to exclude air. I use these for stock developers like ID-11 or Microphen (I reuse these developers at stock strength). For stock fixer and stop bath I just use the empty concentrate bottles, these are both oxidising agents and far less likely to go bad by contact with air. Print developer is usually made up for the session, I might keep it until the next day or so if I've got more to print, but not much longer.

 

[mbisc]

I use the dark-plastic bottles, but not the accordion-style ones. I have both gallon-sized and half-gallon sized, and since they are designed for (photo) checmicals, they are fine for this use, and much cheaper than the accordeon bottles. I keep my Kodak fixer and Kodak Hypo-Clear in there as long as the package states (2 & 3 months, repectively), and never had any problems. I re-use my fixer, so the bottle is always full and with very little air. I use the TMAX developer with replenisher, so no need for special bottles there...

 

[ddutchison]

I mostly re-use the bottles that stock Ilford chemistry comes in, available from 125cc up to 4L.

If you can find a lab that still does real optical prints (even a 1 hr. place), then ask them if they have any discarded chemistry bottles they could give you. These will last for years and they cost a lot less than your accordion bottles. I have 5 Fuji 2L bottles (perfect size for 8X10 trays) that are about a decade old now.