New to film developing

[jwcat]

Not quite true, I did some when I was stationed in Italy from '69 to 73.

I have purchased a Bessa R, and will shoot mostly B&W, scanned into PE3. I have pretty good control of the digital part.

My problem is, I want to develop the film myself. My house has a septic tank and I want to keep the bugs in it happy, so no dumping chemicals into it. I had given up on the process, but have been reading about Diafine on this forum. This seems to be a solution (no pun intended) to my problems. Keep using it for a year or so, then find a ecological way to dump and start over.

What about Fixer? How can I handle this? I like available light work, so will probably use TriX. At what speed?

If this works out, I will try learning bulk loading and save some coins.

Thank you in advance...John

[bmattock]

Florida has a "Household Hazardous Waste" collection program, as do most states in the US. You're in Ocala, right? Several drop-off locations for your chemicals.

You can start here: http://www.dep.state.fl.us/waste/cat.../household.htm

I did a quick search and found lots of drop-off locations, but not knowing exactly where you are, you'll probably want to do your own search.

Hope this helps!

Best Regards,

Bill Mattocks

[T_om]

Er, John... how about just putting the used fixer on your garden plants?

Most film (and paper fixer for that matter) is just Ammonium Thiosulphate. While you would not like to chug a six-pack yourself, your plants would love the stuff.

It is sold, in liquid form, in nursery shops as a fertilizer because it consists of about 15% pure nitrogen and 20 or 30% sulfur. In a pinch, you can even use this agricultural grade stuff as film fixer if you HAD to.

Your choice of Diafine is a good one for the environment as it is not disposed of after each use, but even if you had to do so it is not very toxic. Diafine is mostly sodium sulfite and hydroquinone.

Sodium sulfite is probably more harmful inhaled than anything else, especially if you have asthma. It readily oxidizes when exposed to light and air and if sprayed over an area and allowed to evaporate it leaves various salts behind and not much else.

Hydroquinone is the real bad guy here, at least from a human *ingestion* point of view. Don't drink this stuff it will kill you.

But even as bad as it is if ingested, it is highly biodegradable. As bad as it is for you, your septic system could probably break it down pretty readily as long as you are not pouring gallons of it down the sink every day.

The suggestion above to use your cities disposal services is a good one, but some of the chemicals we use are really not that bad.

Tom

PS: You will love Diafine.

[jwcat]

Thanks for the info...now to get started.

[Roman]

Originally Posted by T_om

Er, John... how about just putting the used fixer on your garden plants?

Most film (and paper fixer for that matter) is just Ammonium Thiosulphate. While you would not like to chug a six-pack yourself, your plants would love the stuff.

It is sold, in liquid form, in nursery shops as a fertilizer because it consists of about 15% pure nitrogen and 20 or 30% sulfur. In a pinch, you can even use this agricultural grade stuff as film fixer if you HAD to.

Tom,
used fixer also contains quite a lot of silver, and THAT is the real problem when disposing of it! The silver accumulates in organisms, so it's not a good idea to water your plants (and maybe eat their fruit) with it...
Roman

[T_om]

Roman,

This is very true. However, the accumulation of silver in plants is problematic at best. Unless the combined silver thiosulphate got into your water supply, you would never be exposed to the compound as silver uptake of plants is practically zero. Silver, of course, occurs naturally. The other elements in fixer are actually just plant fertilizer. I would think you would be exposed to more silver eating food off of a silver plate with silver utensils than you would be eating plants exposed to sodium thiosulphate from a home darkroom.

The amount of silver in a home darkroom fixer bath varies, of course, but I would not think it very deleterious, especially to ornamental plants.

I will readily admit however, that the previous poster had the best idea. Contact the city waste department for a disposal site and take the fixer there.

Tom