Photux
Hello everyone,
When I went to prepare some fresh fixer yesterday, I noticed yellowish deposits on the inside of the bottle and also as flakes in the liquid. As I already had a bad feeling about it, I tested it briefly on a small piece of film and found that the fixer is apparently completely useless (even after several minutes, there was no discernible change in the film).
What’s actually surprising is that the fixer in question isn’t some ancient stuff, but a bottle of Adofix Plus that’s still two-thirds full, which I bought about a year ago. The batch was manufactured on 12 January 2024. Apart from preparing a working solution from it once, it’s just been sitting in my kitchen ever since.
Hence my question: have any of you had similar problems? Is there perhaps a known issue with this particular batch? Otherwise, I’ve only ever had trouble with Tetenal Superfix once, a long time ago; Adofix has been reliable so far.
The only other thing I can think of is the temperature – I don’t usually heat my kitchen, so it can get rather chilly in winter. But it’s not below freezing now, nor just above it. Perhaps the concentrate didn’t like that?
I think I’ll give the powder version a go now. Unfortunately, I only ordered two weeks ago and thought to myself: I don’t need fixer, I’ve still got plenty left. Oh well. If it meant better shelf life and reliability, I’d buy the expensive stuff from Ilford, but so far I’ve never seen the point in spending more money than necessary on fixer.
Thanks and best regards
Photux
MirkoBoeddecker
I’m sorry to hear that the concentrate isn’t working anymore.
We haven’t had a faulty batch (at least, I’m not aware of any so far).
It’s true that fixers don’t last forever either. I’ve written about this before. However, the concentrate should last longer than six months, even after it’s been partially opened.
Unopened concentrates should last for at least three years from the production date. A temperature of 10 degrees in the kitchen isn’t the cause.
With fixers, it’s unfortunately always a bit hit-and-miss. The buffer system normally stabilises things until it suddenly collapses completely.
So if you can already smell sulphur, the fixer won’t be working properly anymore and should be discarded.
All express fixers are very similar in terms of their formulation. The differences, if any, lie in the shelf life (in the buffer system).
Ours (Agefix formula) is already in the top league (as you’ve observed yourself).
I can’t say exactly what’s happened in your case, but it’s also rather unlikely that switching brands would make a difference.
Best regards,
Mirko
