Hi, I recently began processing black and white film again and like to wait till I have 4 rolls of 35mm that fit in one of the larger tanks. All the sizes I have and have seen take the 4 reel but have a 3/4 inch+ space that lets the reels slosh around. Not good in my opinion. In the past I used a 110 or 16mm reel that filled it perfectly but I'm not finding those for sale anywhere. I once also coiled up a piece of stainless stell that worked fine also but alas can't seem to find any ss around. I'll figure something out but there must be a common solution that you folks have found and used-something found around the house every day etc...

Thanks up front, W

-- Warren Allen (whatrix@home.com), January 12, 2002

Answers

Walt, You might want to leave the small amount of slosh in the tanks. I have processed well over 40,000 rols of film by hand in stainless steel tanks. My conclusions on processing in 4 reel tanks is that having a small amount of movement up and down in the tanks helps to uniformly process the film (the upward and downward sliding of the reels eliminates the problem of the top and bottom rolls getting more agitation, as well as eliminate the possibility of bromide drag on the two middle ones). If you are getting surge from the play you are probably inverting them too hard, soft or unevenly ( i am guessing you are using the inversion method, or you would probably not be concerned with the gap). My suggestion, buy two 16 oz tanks, and process them side by side. George

-- George (zbeeblebrox42@yahoo.com), January 13, 2002.

Thanks, I like to have a small amount of movement and found the 16mm reel added in left about 1/8 inch which allowed the reels to move and agitate the developer more. The 3/4 inch seems a little drastic and in fact I wont even try it as it goes against what I've learned. Basically: if it aint broke don't fix it. W

-- Warren Allen (whatrix@home.com), January 13, 2002.

What I did was to measure the space between the top-most reel and the snug cover and then sawed off the top of an empty, plastic film container to use as the "spacer" to snug down the ss reels. With this spacer, I do not hear my ss reels slide around for the end-over-end agitation. If you need additional details, email me off-line.

Hope this helps...

-- john l bagtas (jlbagtas@shaw.ca), January 13, 2002.

I make spacers from 120 film spools--clip the ends to the right size to fit your tank/reel combo.

-- Ed Buffaloe (edb@unblinkingeye.com), January 14, 2002.

I use an old Nikor SS 4-reel tank in which the 4 reels can slide a bit, too. I used to add a spacer of soft plastic tubing to prevent it, but haven't bothered for the last few years. I'd just ignore it if I were you.

-- Tim Nelson (timothy.nelson@yale.edu), January 14, 2002.