Glacial Acetic Acid Story

[Alan Curtis]

This week I decided to buy more stop bath, I usually buy Glacial Acetic Acid by the gallon and it will last a long long time. B&H won't ship it so I contacted Calumet, they have it for $28/gallon +$168 shipping to Florida (hazardous material) . Wow, I really didn't want to pay $200 for vinegar on steroids. I went to my local pool/janitorial chemical supply and it was $11.00/gallon. Now if they will only start stocking Dektol and HC110.

[ic-racer]

Thats good to know. I posted a thread about this on APUG about a year ago with the same problem. In my case I lucked out as my local store got another gallon of Kodak brand in, so I am set for a few years.

[BarryS]

Thanks for the tip. I just ordered some and the shipping was 4X the cost of the acetic acid, and another photog I know is still smarting after ordering it from Calumet. Now someone can be a real hero if they can tell me where i might find some nitric acid locally. I need a small amount to pH my wet plate silver bath and would love to avoid the hazmat shipping fees.

[emo supremo]

Let me try to redeem myself after my faux pas on the inch-type way of characterizing a lens. Glacial acetic acid is w/w% and diluted acetic acid is w/v. The specific gravity is used to convert from one to the other. Not that this is a big deal. I doubt slight errors introduced by converting between w/v to w/w is a big deal for stop bath but you are going to need a lot more of the dilute acid to make up what you used to use mixing up from the glacial acetic stock.

[Alan Curtis]

Barry
Try some of your local Pharmacy's. Nitric acid is used for many usual things and they might be able to get it for you without the awful shipping cost.

[BarryS]

Thanks Alan--I'll give it a try, but they're all chains around here and will probably call the cops after I ask. :)

[Nathan Potter]

Form a company. Get incorporated in your state and get a tax exempt number. Then order from any large scientific company like Fisher or Cole Parmer, etc. You'll do much better price wise. Call yourself something like Optical Microsystems Inc., etc. etc. etc. Make sure the name is not taken.

Nate Potter, Austin TX. (Austin Microsystems Inc.)... it's taken. :) :)

[Gene McCluney]

In general, for "difficult" chemicals like this (even though I am a pro photographer) in order to avoid paying excessive shipping, I have had a photo store that I am friends with the manager, include my order in with his chemical order for his mini-lab. This includes chemicals such as acetic acid (which he does not use in his mini-lab).

[Pete Watkins]

5-10 grammes of Citric Acid a litre makes a good enough acid stopbath. Just don't save it. I'ts cheap and dosen't stink.
Pete

[Gary L. Quay]

I odrered a quart to acedic acid glacial from digitaltruth.com last year and didn't pay hazmat charges. This isn't a plug, but one wonders if this is specific to Florida, or something recently imposed.

[Ed Pierce]

This started several years ago...B&H stopped shipping stop bath and Calumet started adding hazmat shipping to the glacial acetic. Last I checked, Calumet still ships Kodak Indicator stop at normal rates.

[Jim Michael]

Gary, the hazmat charges can be volume/weight related, so it may be possible that a quart wouldn't trigger the charge but a gallon would.

[Lynn Jones]

Hi Alan,

If you are in a good sized city, go to a chemical supply house. They usually come in 1 gal jugs or 18 gal stainless steel carboys.

Lynn

[neil poulsen]

The concentrated glacial acetic acid sold for s.b. is serious stuff. My next purchase will be citric acid.

[Kirk Keyes]

I use citric with a splash of Kodak Indicator Stop, just enough to get some color from the indicator, but not enough to make it too stinky.