Staining developers - do they need distilled water?

[Jerevan]

I am thinking of using a staining developer (some sort of Pyro, I guess) but I don't have a good access to distilled water - do they absolutely need this? Am I playing with madness using normal, filtered water?

[hobbes]

Well, if you don't have tools to measure the quality of your tap water, just give it a shot and compare the results to a neg developed in distilled one - this will cost you just one 1l of demineralized/distilled water and two rolls of film, few drops of Pyro can be negligible at this point I guess

[mikebarger]

All water systems are different, but I mix 510 Pyro with tap water without problem. I agree with Dominik, give it a shot.

Mike

[Jerevan]

Yep, I will give it a try - a little practice beats any theory in this case. Thanks for the reminder, guys!

[TheFlyingCamera]

I do Pyrocat HD in filtered but not distilled tap water. Never had a problem.

[Mike Wilde]

I mostly concur with Scott. I did/do have a problem getting all of the alkali to stay in soluton in the "B" with my home mixed from the PMK formula.

I used reveres osmosis water, but there is still (metaborate) stuff that settles to the bottom of the bottle, which must be shaken into suspension each time before I measure off what I need to do my best to ensure batch to batch consistency.

[jeffreyg]

I use distilled water with PMK Pyro. The water is readily available here and I don't trust our home water system which softens and removes iron. We also drink bottled water. I just wondered if collecting rainwater would be a decent substitute for Jerevan ? I have used our home water with ID11 and print developers with no problems though. I may be over cautious with the pyro.

http://www.jeffreyglasser.com

[TheFlyingCamera]

There's a LOT of other stuff in rainwater - plenty of industrial contaminants that could cause as many problems as what comes through the tap. Frankly, I'd be less concerned about unfiltered tap water than rainwater.

[GregY]

I've never had problems using tap water with either PMK or currently Pyrocat HD in glycol.

[pgomena]

The only problem I've had with tap water and Pyrocat-HD is with air dissolved in the water as it comes from the tap. My concern at the time was premature oxidation of the working solution. There's so little of the stock solution used to make the working solution that I didn't want it affected. Letting it sit overnight would solve that problem. The water in my area is naturally soft and iron-free.

That said, I usually use either distilled or de-ionized water to mix my working solution. I have it on hand for mixing photo-flo anyway. At the rate I use developer, the cost is not prohibitive.

Peter Gomena