Redwood grid for Darkroom sink.

[Greg Blank]

I've seen a few darkroom sinks have a Redwood grid that lifts up stuff put inside to allow draining. Any thoughts why Redwood should be used versus say plastic used for the same reason?
I've a good supply of Redwood, but it seems a waste of pretty wood for the purpose.

[Mark Sampson]

I believe that Redwood is the traditional answer here because it decays more slowly when wet. I've worked in numerous darkroom sinks with wooden 'duckboards' and most of them were made of redwood... and had been in use for a long time.

[Keith Pitman]

I used a material called Dri-Dek and is used on the floor behind bars. I found it at a local restaurant supply, but I’ve seen it on EBay. Works great.

[John Kasaian]

Wouldn't teak work better?

[Mark Sampson]

It might. most of the duckboards that I remember were so grey-ed out by time and water that it wasn't obvious what they were made of. I'll be building a darkroom sink soon, and will probably go with something synthetic, although my thinking is far from done about this.

[Tin Can]

I had three stainless steel sinks. One with stainless steel duck boards. Never liked them.

I sold 2 sinks and now use one 7 ft without duckboards as I clean up and wash it all down after every usage.

The trays are cleaned too and stood up to drain.

I also gave away a brown fiberglass photosink to a gardner. He drilled holes in it...

I have my 16X20 print washer in a big laundry sink on rubber feet so water can drain out.

My gas burst system is in a standard sized laundry tub.

All 3 sinks have 1-1/2 P traps.

[Drew Wiley]

Really bad idea. Redwood bleeds tannic acid. Most of it today is farmed second growth which can decay, esp if it contains sapwood. The type supposed to be used for hot tubs etc is all heart clear old growth, hard to get. A mistake of this nature probably won't ruin anything unless your prints come into actual contact with the wood, but expect sink stains, crud buildup etc. You'd have to assemble the thing with 316 stainless staples. Plastic is so much easier. Anything wooden would need to be pickled with penetrating marine epoxy to be made inert.

[Tin Can]

I agree with the last poster.

[Greg]

Made my "grid" with strips of Marine plywood (an overkill, Outdoor plywood costs less and would also work) and then applied 3 coats of BEHR Low Luster Enamel PORCH & PADIO Floor paint (a very, very thick paint). Has held up going on almost daily use for 2+ years with normal photo chemicals and alternative processes. Making Chemigrams definitely taxes it, but cleans up easily with a warm soapy water solution.
One time came across a stainless steel grid in a used commercial kitchen supply house. Unfortunately it was gone when I went to purchase it a few days later.

[Keith Fleming]

In 1998, having no carpentry skills, I had a sink (8 feet long) built out of plywood. The bottom of the sink sloped down to one corner where the drain was located. On each of the long sides (the interior) was a 1X2 that was level with the one on the other side, and a minimum of 2 inches above the bottom of the sink. My duckboards (there were 2 to make removal easier) were of standard 1X2's, and the ends rested on those level pieces. Everything got multiple coats of polyurethane paint--with a couple of additional coats every few years for good measure. One mistake with the duckboards was to initially use regular wood screws, which very quickly had to be replaced with stainless steel. I could even stand on those duckboards--though it made me nervous to do so. The sink was still in great condition when we sold the house in 2014. The marine epoxy might have been a better choice, but I had heard it had strong fumes when being applied. and the sink had to be built in a room in the basement room after we moved into the house. Since the room remained dry due to a radiant heater near the ceiling, the new owner tore out the sink and used the room for dry storage. Note that my radiant-heater method of keeping the darkroom always at 68 degrees was feasible because I'm out on the Olympic Peninsula of Washington State. That would not have worked back in Virginia.
Keith

[Jim Jones]

A grill from a ceiling fluorescent light fixture might work well.

[scheinfluger_77]

I used these in my photo lab sink, they worked very well and were cheap.

[John Layton]

I think its a really bad idea to place anything in a darkroom sink, or on a darkroom floor for that matter...which has any degree of porosity and/or any tendency/capacity to retain moisture. Even a wood lattice which is coated with epoxy can be difficult to clean thoroughly...and if left in place in a sink bottom will eventually get full of crud - but if a good lab brush is used for this cleaning and the lattice is then stood up on end for drying between sessions...then things might be OK. But why make this trouble for yourself?

I built my current sink out of 3/4" birch plywood, and (after installing a ventilation system) gave it multiple coats of marine epoxy. After a darkroom session, all trays get well rinsed and stacked sideways so they can dry prior to under-sink storage. Labware gets placed into a plastic coated dish drainer which stands up on feet at one end of the sink, and is allowed to dry prior to under-sink storage. The sink itself is 16 feet long, and is slightly slanted towards its draining end...but I still have a squeegee dedicated to the sink bottom which I'll use after darkroom sessions.

[Tin Can]

Let's repeat that

and I agree




I think its a really bad idea to place anything in a darkroom sink, or on a darkroom floor for that matter...which has any degree of porosity and/or any tendency/capacity to retain moisture. Even a wood lattice which is coated with epoxy can be difficult to clean thoroughly...and if left in place in a sink bottom will eventually get full of crud - but if a good lab brush is used for this cleaning and the lattice is then stood up on end for drying between sessions...then things might be OK. But why make this trouble for yourself?

I built my current sink out of 3/4" birch plywood, and (after installing a ventilation system) gave it multiple coats of marine epoxy. After a darkroom session, all trays get well rinsed and stacked sideways so they can dry prior to under-sink storage. Labware gets placed into a plastic coated dish drainer which stands up on feet at one end of the sink, and is allowed to dry prior to under-sink storage. The sink itself is 16 feet long, and is slightly slanted towards its draining end...but I still have a squeegee dedicated to the sink bottom which I'll use after darkroom sessions.

[John Layton]

Think for a moment about the purpose of those duckboards...and what will happen to whatever spills onto and underneath them.

Then, do yourself a favor and install/apply some non absorbent flooring (like vinyl or epoxy) which can be wiped clean when necessary. Kind of a no-brainer if you ask me!

[Jerry Bodine]

I installed two Calumet (before they went belly up) stainless steel sinks, one 7-footer & one 4-footer end-to-end. Then I went with plastic corrugated roofing, easily cut to the needed length in each sink. They serve their purpose well and are very light. After a session is finished I rinse them and the sinks off with a kitchen sink sprayer (installed at each sink). To dry, they are stood on end, resting on a towel and leaning against the tensioned overhead steel cable for drying films. The sinks are squeegeed then towel-dried, and given an occasional thorough cleaning with Calumet's recommended products. Trays are rinsed, towel-dried and placed with their short sides resting on the rim of the sinks, then when thoroughly dry are stored in an under-sink slotted bin - for trays up to 20x24 - that I built and attached (removable concept) to the under-sink shelf.

[Drew Wiley]

There was an individual proliferating quite a bit of how-to literature in this area about making darkroom sinks using marine grade plywood and marine epoxies. Why? He was the manufacturer of the epoxy. And people thought they would save a lot of money that way. But a basic sink would need around $200 of penetrating epoxy plus epoxy putty for the seams; and real marine ply would double that expense. You could take a lesser grade of ply and fiberglass it for considerably less. Nasty fumes either way. For really serious users I sold a liquid Hypalon rubber coating so nasty that now it takes a special Federal permit within the bounds of US waters. Likewise, polysilicone enamels. Back then you could also buy moisture-cure urethane coatings (totally different from ordinary urethanes). The faster it could kill you, the better it was. I dodged all those bullets and made my own 10ft sink out of heat-welded 1/4" thick polypropylene sheeting. It doesn't sweat underneath like stainless, is highly inert to all dkrm chem and solvents, but does superficially stain a bit with amidol. I don't use duckboards. I attach inert little feet to water jackets, oversize trays, etc, or integrally include risers when making slot washers.

[MrFujicaman]

Drew, I think Gordon Hutchings might of had the best idea-build it out of plywood and haul it over to Rhino Liner (spray on truck bed liner) and have them spray it. He said the only thing he'd found that stained it was Pyro.

Me being cheap, I built mine out of plywood and 1 by 4's for the sides and gave it 3 coats of Rustolem truck bed liner. After 2&1/2 years, it's still water tight. It's kind of ugly, but it gets the job done. It stains a bit, but if it really bothered me, I have a spray can of the stuff to touch it up with. After all, it's a sink-not a work of art.

[Luis-F-S]

Made these out of treated pine about 10 years ago, they still look new and have worked Great. L

195509

[Drew Wiley]

Hi MrFuji ... I was the coatings buyer and tech advisor for a company that sold many millions of dollars of product per year of coatings to the Navy, Coast Guard, defense contractors all across the Pacific, private marine use, local heavy industry, very high end architectural restorations, the most expensive wood homes ever built within our lifetimes, plus the immense yachts owned by these same people. So I have some serious credentials. But like everyone else here, I had a limited personal darkroom budget, even if it is a somewhat deluxe setup for a mere individual, and made due with all kinds of things I scrounged for a bargain, or could barter a print for. There are all kinds of options for making and sealing sinks, some better, some worse. Gordon Hutchings worked for the CA transportation Dept, so might have logically adapted the idea of a truck bed liner from his experience with actual trucks. I don't like to redo things, so wanted a lifetime sink that I didn't have to worry about. But it drains into a sump which has a chemical-resistant pump that does need to be replaced about every 20 yrs or so. This is also earthquake country, so it is imperative that joints and seals are highly resistant to structural stresses.

[Vaughn]

Ah...the smell of the photojournalism darkroom...the smell of the chemical infused redwood brings back memories -- mostly remembering how I would never allowed the redwood into the Art Dept darkroom I was in charge of.

[Tin Can]

plus one

i remember redwood picnic tables

[Drew Wiley]

Doubt it. Mostly junk pine stained a stereotypical "picnic table red" color, also used for fences, which doesn't look like real redwood at all. Although redwood was abundantly used here, where it grew, it was expensive to ship east. People in the East don't know what redwood actually looks like. I had to coach big stain manufacturers how to blend the color so it looked realistic; then their products caught on big. That was important if they were to ever sell the product here, when remodelers were trying to blend old and new wood together. Getting an even more natural look required the introduction of transparent transoxide pigments. These began near here at the world's biggest optical coating lab; yup. Might sound strange, but they were made by vac deposition just like lens coatings except on massive scale, then scraped off as tiny transparent colored particles which deeply penetrate the wood and don't fade. The stock values of that coating lab shot through the roof, until they finally split the operation into optical versus industrial colorant divisions, and sold everything off to separate players. Now there are more cost effective methods for making transoxides. For my own needs, I belong to the third category - just let redwood age naturally, and after awhile it all looks the same; rarely, a true silver gray, which most requires a lot of time in salty in air. What does go true silver gray is Port Orford Cedar, which begins blonde, and is what authentic totem poles were made out of in the northwest.

[Tin Can]

The 50's was the last time I saw one:(

[Drew Wiley]

WalMart sells em, cheap. Cheapo Depot subcontracts analogous fence installations to fly-by-night labor, non-code stained pine put together with thin ordinary staples; they fall over in about six months. I still get true heart redwood at substantial discount at my old work place, but it's expensive even for me. But I want my fences to last my lifetime, and build them like a tank. Making a fence that lasts just 20 yrs (the average), no thanks. I don't want to have to re-do it in my 80's or 90's! The house I sold in the mtns was made of old growth redwood. My house here on the coast just has some redwood wainscotting, but it's old-growth vertical grain, something no longer available. It was leftover from a sale to the Navy. The admiral's house was particularly swank, if modest in size. That whole military village is nearing final restoration for sake of becoming a public park. Fortunately, it's been fenced off and guarded all along, so taggers never got in there. Adjacent to it was the biggest winery building in the world, which was converted to military use during WWII, and is sometimes opened to photographic tours, but is due to be permanently open. The last active whaling station of the W Coast is beside that - whales turned into Cal Can dog food! Lots of big redwood logs on the shore, all weathered and wave eroded.

[Tin Can]

No doubt

At least you have stopped telling me what I know or don't

I was worried about your psychic powers


Carry on

[Drew Wiley]

If I had psychic powers, maybe I could get the redwoods to grow again atop the hill behind me - that's where the tallest tree on earth was cut down about about 140 yrs ago. There were redwoods everywhere around here. Now not even a stump, but lots of highly flammable eucalyptus. All our neighborhood redwoods are now second-growth, ornamental replants. I had a friend who had a downfall permit and portable mill, which means he could cut and sell old growth trees which had fallen on their own next to back roads. But that was up in the narco counties of NW Cal, and he had friction with the backwoods growers, who eventually murdered him. Now his sons continue the business. The technical aspects of redwood as a material were extensively studied at the UCB Forest Products Lab along the shore here. As both a supplier and consultant to the trade, I had to learn quite a bit myself. Then all that kind of research was transferred inland to UC Davis, and for about six years my wife worked in a biotech corp which took over that same building. Now all that is becoming converted into the second campus of Lawrence Berkeley Lab, with shoreline biking and hiking trails all along it, not particularly photogenic; but those same trails are being connected to the more interesting parks further north along the shore. But as I already hinted, the past is present in the form of big gray redwood logs piled up by waves numerous places on the coast. It's awfully tempting to home an 8x10 onto the intricate wave-worn details.

[John Layton]

I built a house in 1989-1990 for my then-young family...and since then have grown to feel badly that the wood I'd used had been taken from old growth forests in the Pacific northwest. Thing is...that wood was incredibly stable - bundles of 2x4's and 2x6's could sit in the sun all day and not twist.

Wood quality/stability these days is all over the place...and now, whenever I find myself building a stud-wall for some addition/project for my current house, I usually need a Jorgensen wooden clamp as a "third hand" to hold the twisted studs straight as I secure them - a real PITA!

[domaz]

WalMart sells em, cheap. Cheapo Depot subcontracts analogous fence installations to fly-by-night labor, non-code stained pine put together with thin ordinary staples; they fall over in about six months. I still get true heart redwood at substantial discount at my old work place, but it's expensive even for me. But I want my fences to last my lifetime, and build them like a tank. Making a fence that lasts just 20 yrs (the average), no thanks. I don't want to have to re-do it in my 80's or 90's! The house I sold in the mtns was made of old growth redwood. My house here on the coast just has some redwood wainscotting, but it's old-growth vertical grain, something no longer available. It was leftover from a sale to the Navy. The admiral's house was particularly swank, if modest in size. That whole military village is nearing final restoration for sake of becoming a public park. Fortunately, it's been fenced off and guarded all along, so taggers never got in there. Adjacent to it was the biggest winery building in the world, which was converted to military use during WWII, and is sometimes opened to photographic tours, but is due to be permanently open. The last active whaling station of the W Coast is beside that - whales turned into Cal Can dog food! Lots of big redwood logs on the shore, all weathered and wave eroded.

My local lumberyard in the PNW has Clear Vertical Grain Fir available. You don't want to know the price though. My house is from the 1920s and was a poorly maintained rental before I bought it. The window sills have been missing paint for probably about 5 years and getting rained on constantly. I've recently started the process of repainting them and haven't found a hint of rot anywhere. That old wood seems indestructible.

[Tin Can]

The area I now live in was clear cut and destroyed. My 1920 home is made of all first growth hardwood covered by vinyl siding. Even interior walls are covered up hardwood. Nearby is a 1818 cabin when IL became a state and it was all trees.

I have 1 huge oak tree that must be a survivor and a couple wannabees.

Now the Feds want to cut the Shawnee Forest again!

Here's USDA history of what happened. The CCC made the whole area great again.

I expect data like this will be erased.

https://www.fs.usda.gov/detailfull/shawnee/learning/history-culture/?cid=stelprdb5151363

"Morris Birkbeck's 1818 booklet, LETTERS FROM ILLINOIS ...the view of that noble expanse (the Ohio River) was like the opening of a bright day upon the gloom of the night, to us who had been so long buried in deep forests. It is a feeling of confinement, which begins to damp the spirits, from this complete exclusion of distant objects. To travel day after day, among trees of a hundred feet high, without a glimpse of the surrounding country, is oppressive to a degree which those cannot conceive who have not experienced it; and it must depress the spirits of the solitary settler to pass in this state. His visible horizon extends no farther than the tops of the trees..."

[Drew Wiley]

Domaz - the company I worked for originally began with two lumber buyers for the Navy, who went into commercial partnership after WWII and started supplying the military afterwards. Not until the 70's did it significantly expand into coatings, equipment, etc, when I took on those kinds of opportunities. We held the largest stockpile of high quality kiln-dried fir and redwood in the Bay area. But for awhile, while there were still several large Naval bases on SF Bay, the Navy was a prime customer and got whatever they specified. Their fire extinguisher trainings at these bases required a certain pitch content of wood; so they'd come and buy 40K of clear kiln-dried vertical-grain fir at the time - furniture-grade, and burn it all up on a bonfire within fifteen minutes a few days later. That incensed me. But's that's just the mentality of the military. More recently, a very well known techie gazillionaire bought half the world's supply of Port Orford cedar for his house. He wouldn't like a particular feature or another, so would have up to three million worth torn down at a time during original construction, and then start over on that section of the house. Some good friends of mine built it, and we supplied everything but the cedar. Port Orford is exceptionally squirrelly dense stuff which requires a lot of thickness planing on site. The workers couldn't figure out why they could never got over their "colds" and bronchitis (tannic acid inhalation from the sawdust). The gazillionaire only lived in it a few months, and in the meantime, decided his yacht was too small, so had a wooden yacht built big enough for a full basketball court on deck; then even that was too small, so built the biggest yacht in the world out of carbon fiber. Thus enormous quantities of various species of old growth forest get chopped down just to assuage the egos of the very rich. It's always been like that. The Romans almost wiped out entire species of large mammals north of the Sahara for sake of their bloody gladiatorial shows. I don't know how much guilt I share; but over the years I've been given leftovers of various hardwoods from those big projects, and have milled them myself into picture frames etc. But it sure beats burning them. A different famous techie gazillionaire/philanthropist ordered custom porch benches made of select endangered tropical hardwood by a local furniture maker to the tune of 40K apiece, about a dozen at a time, but didn't want to bother using marine finishes, so every six months threw them out after the wood began to discolor, and ordered a new set. Waste, waste, waste.

[Vaughn]

plus one

i remember redwood picnic tables

We had some nice ones in our USFS campgrounds -- and could order replacements made with fallen old-growth from the State Parks.

[Drew Wiley]

Now the NP tables are molded recycled poly/sawdust composite, much like Trex decking. They stain with grease just as bad too.