Stop baths

[jnanian]

i use just plain old water like les, with no problems ...
if you don't like the smell of stop, sprint makes a stop bath
and it smells like, mmmmmmmmm vanilia

john

pstt, they are a site sponsor too

[fschifano]

Well, the choice of whether or not to use an acid stop bath depends on your choice of developer and fixer. When using staining developers, the common wisdom is to avoid the acid stop and fix to preserve the stain which masks the grain. The makers of Diafine, a specialty high speed developer, also recommend against a stop bath after development, but make no recommendations against an acid fixer. If you choose to use an alkaline or neutral fixer, then you should also avoid using an acid stop bath. These fixers may not be well buffered and the carry over of acid can lessen their capacity.

For the normal stuff like D-76, XTOL, HC-110, Perceptol, Microdol-X, ID-11, et. al., used in conjunction with an acidic fixer, there is no good reason to avoid, and several good reasons to use, an acid stop provided that your fixing bath is also acidic. Outside of the caveats mentioned in the previous paragraph, I always use an acid stop and it has never caused any sort of mischief.

[bdial]

I'm with John and Les, for film, I've never used anything but water for stop. For most of my years of developing film my developer of choice has been D-76.

[aldevo]

I've always processed film using a water stop and processed paper using an acid fixer (generally the vanilla-smelling Sprint product). Both work well.

[Ole]

I use stop bath only for lith printing, and then it's the "a spoonful of citric acid in a tray of water" variety.

Anything else, I just use water. Sometimes not even that...

[pentaxuser]

I used to use an acid stop bath for film. If you contain it in a bottle and pour directly into the tank and back into a bottle then even the acetic acid stop shouldn't smell too harsh but if it does then the "odourless" citric acid stop can be used.

I have since moved on to water and haven't seen any difference in the negs. If you fill the tank with water,agitate and pour out quickly several times then this seems to overcome any tendency for the dev to continue acting as the remnants of dev is diluted greatly on the first wash and must be virtually non existent by the second wash. If someone with as much experience as Roger Hicks believes that over most development times an extra 15 secs in neither here nor there then the extra dev action accounted for by an extremely diluted dev which is almost all water even on the first rinse suggests that maybe the dangers of not using an acid stop to stop development is very overrated.

Incidentally what does Sprint use which hides/avoids the normal and familiar acidic/vinegar smell? Is it a different substance from the usual acid or simply a strong masking agent to counteract the normal smell?

For paper I have retained the acid stop but I don't think your question was aimed at paper processing.

pentaxuser

[hal9000]

I always thought that a stop bath is required when using neutral fixers, but several posters here claim the opposite. The label of the Rollei RXN Neutral Fixing Bath states the following:
"A stop bath must be used before fixing in order to stop development and maintain the neutral pH-value of the the fixing bath."
It seems logical to me that an acidic stop is necessary to halt alkali developer, so when using a neutral fixer an acidic stop would be required. And if no acidic stop is used, then alkali developer will be carried over to the neutral fixer and make it alkali too. Of course carrying over acidic stop bath would lead to the fixer becoming more and more acidic with time. Rollei actually additionally recommends rinsing the print briefly in water between stop bath and fix to avoid this problem.

[Alden]

Citric is so cheap, and easy to drop into a tray, and scentfree. I use it to save the fixer, and I put the print or film into water to remove any of the citric before going to the fixer.

[pesphoto]

Water stop for me also with film

[Les McLean]

I have already said I use water and perhaps I should qualify that a little further. Many have said that the stop bath prolongs the life of fixer which is quite true but IMO it opens the door to the possibility of over working the fixer so I only use my fixer twice for films and if printing all day I change the paper fixer when I break for lunch. By doing this I kinow that my fix is fresh and will not let me down.