I just got back from traveling with 4x5 film and a graflex.

The graflex is a solid metal box, especially with the folding metal hood on the back. The nicest TSA people were miffed they couldn't "burn through it" with their xray machine. They swabbed all my cameras and lenses and film.

Everywhere I went, everything was swabbed with multiple swabs, even the camera equipment after it went through the xray scanner.

3 of the 4 checkpoints, swabbing the film boxes was sufficient for them. One checkpoint they ganged up on me, 4 of them. 1 was making me stay put, another was questioning me about my tickets, one was going through pelican camera case, then another was getting into my film boxes, and I was keeping an eye on the tray of important personal items as other travelers continued to pass by. I was able to multitask enough to notice the lady starting to open my film boxes. Lots of duct tape bought me plenty of time to notice and tell her to not open that box. She demanded I either let her open it, xray it, or leave. I let them xray it, and was on my way.

Next time, I will send the film separately via UPS or USPS. I wanted to send the film back that way, but the UPS/Fedex places were closed saturday night/sunday morning, and I was flying on sunday.