Pyrocat HD source?

[Michael Kadillak]

I mix my own Pyrocat HD a gallon at a time (in my backyard or in my open door garage with breathing protection) with distilled water and keep it in amber bottles and even though I process a lot of sheet film, it still takes me 12-18 months to use up the developer and have never experienced any loss in effectiveness with oxidation for which the glycol option is considered the operational "hedge". IMHO Pyrocat HD is easy to mix which concurrently makes it the least expensive developer to use with only the basics of lab equipment needed. Mix this chemistry yourself as well as all of your other photographic chemicals and purchase film and photographic paper with the savings.

[Andrew O'Neill]

Mix from scratch. Glycol is awesome but I only used it once... I go through a lot of developer so not worth it. Glycol is EXPENSIVE to bring it up here.

[Fred L]

Mix from scratch. Glycol is awesome but I only used it once... I go through a lot of developer so not worth it. Glycol is EXPENSIVE to bring it up here.

am waiting to hear back from Jacques at Argentix to see what he charges for the large size.

[esearing]

No need for glycol if you make smaller volumes or can store in smaller volumes without air. I buy the premixed because I am low volume shooter and 50L kit will last for a year's worth of film.
Do you have the equivalent of an "ArtCraft" chemistry provider in Canada?

[esearing]

I also just noticed that the amount of Potassium Bromide (restrainer) is different between the Water and Glycol versions at PF. That may or may not make a difference in development time but buy the one you intend to use long term.

[David Schaller]

I mixed my own for the first time last year, and used the same development times as I had for years with the glycol version.

[jp]

If you use your pyrocat hd kit slowly, dispense the 500ml concentrate part-A into 100 or 250ml glass bottles and it will last even longer as long as they are airtight and not opened till needed. Part-B is just to change the PH into a working range and lasts very well.

If you make it yourself, try pyrocat hdc, which has one less ingredient to hunt down and is similar otherwise.

For Glycol I used https://www.amazon.com/Hercules-3525...dp/B00IG45P7K/ Cryo-Tek antifreeze which I bought at a local hardware store. The concentrate is blue (like 2000 flushes). It loses the blue and turns amber as soon as part-B is added.

[Jim Noel]

I have mixed my own Pyrocat HD since before it was available commercially. I mix Part A in glycol and use it over an extended period of time. Never a problem mixing or using. I did try some commercial but ended up throwing it away because it did not work as well.

[Michael Kadillak]

All this post has been doing is dancing around an obscure concept. For the benefit of all lets cut directly to the chase.

I feel it would be enormously beneficial for someone to simply and clearly post the costs of Pyrocat HD glycol and distilled (i.e. no glycol) for a standard reasonable volume unit of the developer standardized off of what the Formulary sells it for.

1) The costs in kit for for glycol and non glycol from the Formulary.

2) The costs to mix it from scratch broken out by component costs (chemical costs divided by the weight used to make the standard volume) so the readers can compare apples to apples.

3) The same costs to mix it from scratch including the cost glycol.

I realize there are forum readers that are in more challenging places of the world to get necessary chemicals hence the desire to see the cost analysis by component.

I will start the process and explain the methodology.

being extremely conservative I am adding 20% to the costs of the bulk chemical components from the Formulary online for shipping here is what it takes me to mix 3 liters of Pyrocat HD in this cost comparison:

Sodium Bisulfite ($6/100 grams) need 30 grams - cost component for 3 liters is $1.80

Pyro Catechol ($55/1# or 373 grams) need 150 grams - cost component for 3 liters is $22

Phenidone ($32/100 grams) - need 6 grams - cost component for 3 liters is $1.92

Potassium Bromide ($7.20/100 grams) - need 3 grams - cost component for 3 liters is $0.22

All in I am spending $26 to mix 3 liters of Pyrocat HD from scratch or $8.65/liter of concentrate.

The Formulary sells liquid kits for $19 (glycol I guess costs the same) that produce 10 liters of working developer using the 1:1:100 concentration. You have to read the tech listing to see what the kits can do. So one liter of 1:1 100 usable developer costs $1.90.

Mixing it yourself the costs per liter is $0.085/liter of working solution at 1:1:100. That is a mark up of 22X for the liquid kits relative to the real costs of the materials as listed above. Now maybe folks can properly wrap their head around this issue that has been obscure for some time. As much of this developer as I end up using buying mixed kits would be a foolish proposition as I would be buying them in lots of 10.

Maybe someone can addd the glycol component costs to the cost comparison. Conclusion - Pyrocat HD is the cheapest and most efficient developer one can use as long as you mix it yourself. Plus IMHO the glycol is unnecessary. All of the folks that espouse its needs have never mentioned a failure that caused them to go this route. In 10 years I have never missed a beat using distilled water. Why change if it does not cause a problem?

[Corran]

You forget that PF sells 50 liter kits for only twice as much as the 10 liter. That's what I bought last time, and I'm about 2/3 through the kit. This larger kit is $37

Per your post, 3 liters of undiluted Pyro costs you $26. This will mix 300 liters at standard dilution so 6x the amount of the PF kit.

So the upcharge is more reasonably 9x in comparison if looking at the larger kit.

Thank you for doing the comparison. Personally right now I don't want that kind of volume nor do I want to compound those items so I'm okay spending 9x, especially considering the possibility of waste due to age at my volume (I only use Pyrocat with certain films). Others may be different.