Is it OK to quickly dip my 4x5 negatives into alcohol to expedite drying?

[AtlantaTerry]

With my current living situation I share a house with four other people. Two of them share the upstairs hallway bathroom with me. I convert the bathroom into a sheet film processing line then stretch a cord above the bathtub from which to hang up to 12 Kodak #4A stainless steel sheet film racks.

A cell phone snapshot of my 4x5 sheet film processing line:


The problem I'm having is the racks want to retain the distilled water + PhotoFlo between the metal and the negatives. This means it takes several hours for the negatives to fully dry. When they are finally dry, there are no problems.

One trick I have been using since the '70s to speed drying is to gently move my fingers along the outside of each rack. This causes much of the excess fluid to drain through the perforations in the rack onto my fingers.

My problem is that the two roommates want to take a shower before leaving for college and can't if the negatives are hanging up to dry. This could create a problem with my landlord and I don't want that to happen.

So far what I have been doing is getting up about a half hour before the students do to move the racks to my room so the negatives can finish drying. Of course this means I could damage a negative in transport. Or they could pick up a bit of dust in areas where a negative is not fully dry.

So I have been looking for alternatives.

One would be to place the racks onto one of those As Seen On TV super absorbent orange fabrics. I hope it would quickly wick away the excess fluid.

Another idea is to quickly dip each individual sheet film rack into a solution of denatured alcohol + distilled water + PhotoFlo. I have two questions:
1. would the alcohol mix expedite drying?
2. would the alcohol cause my negatives to be non-archival? I ask because a friend who runs a photo lab says that alcohol is caustic and if he is not careful can soften the glue used in his processing machines. Would that happen with a quick one or two second dip?

I would appreciate any feedback or other ideas on how to expedite drying my negatives.

Thanks,
Terry

[BarryS]

Terry--I suggest taking the film out the of sheet film holders and using cloths pins the clip the corners for hanging. They'll dry fast as long as the humidity isn't too high.

[Andrew O'Neill]

Yes, it would speed up drying, but only on the surface of the negative but most likely not where the racks retain water. I did this all the time during humid, Japanese summers (not with racks, though... just hung by corner). I have negatives that are 20 years old and appear fine to my eyeballs. Are you hanging the racks at an angle? At least this way water will not be able to settle along the bottom edge.

[AtlantaTerry]

Barry: I forgot to add as my 3rd idea to use wood clothes pins. Back in the '70s when I had a very nice darkroom, I tried using spring-powered wood clothes pins for my 4x5 work like I did with 35mm and 120/220 film. BUT sometimes after a while a wet negative would fall to the concrete floor and I was not a happy camper. Yes, I could do that here because they would only fall into the bathtub but still could end up damaged.

Andrew, yes, the racks are hanging at an angle. If you are not familiar with a Kodak #4A stainless steel hanger, there are two hooks (one at each end) of the upper bar. So by connecting one of the end hooks onto the drying line they hang at a nice angle.

A cell phone snapshot of my negatives drying on a line above the bathtub:

[IanG]

Yes, it would speed up drying, but only on the surface of the negative but most likely not where the racks retain water. I did this all the time during humid, Japanese summers (not with racks, though... just hung by corner). I have negatives that are 20 years old and appear fine to my eyeballs. Are you hanging the racks at an angle? At least this way water will not be able to settle along the bottom edge.

Actually if you pass film through 2 or 3 alcohol baths the water is drawn out and film will dry very quickly, not just the surface. It's over 42 years since I last did this but I could get a film dry in 2 or 3 minutes, the last bath was 100% alcohol.

Ian

[Tin Can]

These are pics of 5x7 neg hanging using "Kodak Film Processing Hanger # 6". I got them locally and didn't know what they were, but they sure are great for drying film.

The are made to hang at an angle and have 2 pin point film contacts. While drying I blot the bottom tip of water. film drys very quickly, much faster than in regular hangers.

[Sevo]

It used to be common in press labs (to the point that many photo chemistry makers had ready mixed alcohol/antistatic rinses). It may cause the negatives to become slightly milky (supposedly due to some textural change in the gelatin) - YMMV whether that affects your prints, the major news agency I worked for certainly did not mind it.

But leave out the distilled water - you will only experience a significantly speedier and spotless drying as long as the alcohol content is fairly considerable (IIRC the Tetenal stuff was considered depleted once the alcohol dropped below 70%). If you already start with dilute alcohol, you'll be able to use it for precious few films before it has to be tossed.

Alcohol is not caustic, but it will cause common contact adhesives as used on adhesive tape to soften and swell. Processing machinery and tanks ought to be alcohol safe, none of the Jobo and Colenta tanks and reels I've used it with ever were damaged. As long as you do not have any adhesive tape on your film (pro labs use it to chain film, mark sheets with a job number or fix odd sizes in mismatched frames, and there will be residues from the spool/paper mounting tape on medium and small format rolls), dipping the entire frame is safe - and even bits of tape on the film would not really create damage as long as you don't handle them until dried.

[Harold_4074]

On occasion, I have had more negatives to dry than I have film clips. My solution was to get a pack of plastic clothespins (there are at least two styles made, and maybe more, so you want the ones with the strongest springs) and file down the "inner" bump so that the grip is concentrated at the open end. With this modification, the serrated jaws grip film quite securely. If the clothespins don't have holes at the "handle" end, you will have to add one so that an S-hook (i.e., an opened paper clip) will allow you to hang it from a line.

Your negatives will reach a state of damage resistance sooner if you hang them by one corner, and wick off the water at the lowest corner after about two or three minutes of draining. This will also tend to reduce the watermark effect of any dissolved salts in the water.

[AtlantaTerry]

Randy: you could almost do the same by buying some clothing hangers with spring-powered clips to hold men's pants. Simply adjust the clips to be to one side of center and the combined weight of the clips + film will guarantee hanging at an angle.

[Tin Can]

I got 80 assorted stainless steel clips for $20, they were on Chicago Craigslist for 6 months.

An old man was selling contents of very old, very nice home. The house was almost empty...

Randy: you could almost do the same by buying some clothing hangers with spring-powered clips to hold men's pants. Simply adjust the clips to be to one side of center and the combined weight of the clips + film will guarantee hanging at an angle.