[Andy Stockton]

Hi Davel-

Based on the response, you may be the first…

Let us know how it turns out.

[Andy Stockton]

Hello csant. The directional nature of time has always seemed kind of optional here. Welcome to the past moving forward through and beyond the present. We look forward to your posts.

[Andy Stockton]

Hi Bakody – The plating process shown on the Caswell’s site is non-cyanide based. There is also plating equipment for sale on the Rio Grande Site – http://www.riogrande.com.

I am not actually plating at home, so I can’t answer your questions about formula/recipe but the information you need is on that site. Caswell’s sells an online plating guide that is useful.

I don’t personally recommend cyanide based plating because of the toxicity of the process and the difficulty of disposing of waste.

[Andy Stockton]

You might try the link to this monograph on silvering glass:

http://www.cdags.org/cdags_resources/Making_Glass_Daguerreotypes_2010-04-05.pdf

[Andy Stockton]

Hi Pollywog –

Welcome to CDags. Process cost is a barrier to daguerreotypy and finding a source of affordable plates is a challenge to us all. Consider using the smallest plate you can while learning the craft – and just think about all the money you are saving by not keeping up with all the latest digital gear.

Cheers,

Andy

[Andy Stockton]

Looks like a decent beginning to me, and if Irv says so – feedback doesn’t get any better than that… You might consider making a video of your own process and posting it to get additional pointers.

[Andy Stockton]

Christian-

Thanks so much for writing up your experience on the forum. Great entries like this save others who follow in your footsteps so much time and wasted effort!

Andy

[Andy Stockton]

Christian-

Thanks so much for writing up your experience on the forum. Great entries like this save others who follow in your footsteps so much time and wasted effort!

Andy

[Andy Stockton]

Hi vjpalsa-

Welcome to the forums. You might want to look at this set of posts:

http://www.cdags.org/dagforum/topic.php?id=155#post-2817

Andy

[Andy Stockton]

Perhaps John Hurlock/photolytic will pitch in again on this topic as the forum member with both the experience and professional credentials to speak authoritatively on chemical safety. As a public health nurse the message I give out is that there is an important safety component involved in being a daguerreian; you can put yourself, your family and even your neighbors at risk if you don’t pay attention.

At the same time it is definitely possible to do this process safely if you follow correct procedures. There is no particular reason to be afraid of the process if you take the time to learn what you need to know. We deal with numerous dangerous things in our daily lives – gasoline in our cars, natural gas or propane in water heaters and furnaces, electrical appliances, driving on the freeway, etc. By learning about the dangers involved we reduce our risk. Being a daguerreotypist is no different.

To Bingtan I would say no to the idea of setting up your hood to mimic the Bowling Green mercury vapor film. That process is done with shortwave ultraviolet light which has it’s own health risks – nasty sunburn being the simplest. More important is to set up a proper externally venting fume hood and then measure it regularly with a flow meter to ensure that it is working. Using a smoke source like incense can also give an indication of the effectiveness of your hood.

To Bakody concerning gas masks when using iodine – it is probably overkill if you have an adequate fume hood. All of the halogens can damage lung tissue. Bromine is often seen as more dangerous because we use it in a form that can be spilled, but fumes of either in any concentration can create tissue damage of the airways. The “advantage” the halogens have over mercury is that you always know when you are breathing them. Mercury vapor is much harder to detect as an odor.

I also encourage all practitioners to develop outside storage for their process chemicals and equipment if at all possible. A small fume leak being diluted by outside air is one thing, a small leak building up over time inside your living space is another thing entirely. If you must store inside, be vigilant and test for leaks using any tools you have access to.

There is more to this than can be covered in a short post, but there are endless sources of info on the web. Read freely and stay safe.

Andy

[Andy Stockton]

Hi Daniel – I applaud your effort to stay mercury safe. I bought a Jerome mercury vapor analyzer a while back on e-bay and using it has been quite an education. My experience has been that any item that comes into contact with mercury has a strong potential to continue to give off mercury vapor. This can take place even when there is no visible mercury contamination on the article. The vapor levels frequently exceed safe limits. The only containers that seem to consistently seal in the vapor are glass bottles with a tight sealing PTFE lined cap. I have found that many kinds of plastic bottles allow vapor leakage. The other thing that helps a lot is storing a small glass jar within a larger glass jar. The main outcome of my testing is that I no longer store any mercury in occupied areas – it is kept in protected outdoor locations – this includes my mercury pot which is vapor tight when closed. I believe it is possible to be safe around mercury by exercising prudent storage methods, but encourage people to err on the cautious side as the vapors are invisible if a measuring device is not available. If you can get a meter at an affordable price, do so. If not set containers of mercury indicating powder in your mercury storage and working areas and monitor them. The powder is inexpensive and fairly sensitive in my experience. It is useful to keep a small sample in a sealed jar near the open powder container so you can make an accurate color comparison easily.

[Andy Stockton]

I have done a fair amount of experimentation with acrylic fuming boxes, but I wouldn’t recommend acrylic gesso on wood as a substitute. You would be pretty much in the “unknown zone” with the various ingredients in gesso, and I strongly doubt any paint layer would reliably protect a wood box for very long. I’m willing to be corrected by someone who has tried this, but I wouldn’t go there myself.

It really isn’t all that hard to grind a Pyrex dish lip flat and prepare a ground glass to cover it. Enclose that in a wood box and you have a time proven and safe container. See the Resource page for images of various types.

As for displaying iodine, any lab supply company can sell you a glass jar with an HDPE cap and a PTFE (Teflon) liner that will contain iodine adequately for a display. If the glass stays intact, the iodine – both gaseous and solid will be contained.

[Andy Stockton]

Rob – an impressive piece of equipment and a most helpful response – Thank you! I am glad to hear that you are able to achieve cuts without creating marking at the edges. That was one of my main concerns about using a shear.

[Andy Stockton]

Hi Rob/Dagist – I was re-reading this thread (since the forums have been kind of slow during the holidays) and I saw your mention of having acquired your own metal shear. I have been looking into getting one as well and wonder if you would be willing to share any information on yours? Likes/Dislikes/Words of wisdom or warning?

Thanks.

[Andy Stockton]

I have added these two companies to the Resources page. Thanks for the suggestions.

[Andy Stockton]

Happy Birthday to you both.  🙂

 

[Andy Stockton]

Below from the wiki – are you pouring the fixer into the gold solution? You state the correct method in your post, but I wondered if you accidentally reversed the order? Just a thought.

Gilding Solution

Part A: 1 gram Gold Chloride in 500 mL distilled water (0.2% solution).

Part B: 4 grams Sodium Thiosulfate in 500 mL distilled water (0.8% solution).

Parts A and B are mixed 1:1 right before use.[1]

In preparing the gold chloride solution add the gold chloride to 400ml of distilled water. Rinse the glass vial or ampoule with distilled water into the solution and top up the solution with more distilled water until it is 500ml. Filter the solution and store in a 500ml amber bottle.

When mixing the A and B solutions, always pour the gold into the sodium thiosulfate solution. The yellowish gold solution will turn clear as this occurs. If you pour the thiosulfate into the gold, a brown precipitate can form in the solution. If the precipitate does form, the solution can be reclaimed by adding a couple teaspoons of table salt to the solution and letting it sit overnight. It is also best if your working strength gilding solution is filtered just before use.

[Andy Stockton]

Hi Bing Tan – Best of luck on getting underway. Equipment and supplies are a challenge for everyone. Most of us combine producing our own, contracting it out, and the occasional luck in buying something used.

Don’t worry about modifying your existing cameras to take dags. As long as you stick to modifying film holders, your camera will still be able to use film or whatever it handled before. Many people start with Becquerel Dags because finding or making a mercury pot is a steep challenge. Using small plates at the beginning is definitely easier.

[Andy Stockton]

Thanks Ty. Even your “non-premium” boxes show your great craftsmanship.

[Andy Stockton]

Maybe before they wing their way to a new owner you will grace us with a picture? Your work is always so lovely.

[Andy Stockton]

Interesting discussion. Thanks for the responses. I realized I wasn’t really clear about one thing with the acrylic fuming box I made. The only use of cyanoacrylate in that box is to laminate the thin Teflon layer to the acrylic piece that functions as the top lid. Everything else is joined traditionally with solvent based Weld-On products.

The cyanoacrylate was sold by the same company that sells the etched Teflon. I use the Teflon for it’s reduced coefficient of friction, its’ resistance to Iodine and Bromine and because it has a little bit of “give” that I think results in a better seal than would acrylic/acrylic.

Time will tell if my Teflon delaminates or if the Acrylic and PVC break down from exposure to the fuming chemicals. That’s why I store the box outside of my living space.

[Andy Stockton]

photolytic – your comment about the lack of a true weld between acrylic and cyanoacrylate inspired me to do some further reading. Amazing stuff. I now see where I went wrong – I had assumed that since one of the main ingredients of “superglue” was Polymethyl methacrylate (Acrylic) that there was probably solvent present (which would have caused a weld). With further reading I see that superglue is actually a solvent free glue held in a non-polymerized state with a stabilizer like Hydroquinone. Apparently water molecules start the polymerization process in the Polymethyl methacrylate and Ethyl 2-cyanoacrylate. No solvent, no weld. (At least if I have fully understood what I read).

Very basic info here: http://adhesive-formula.blogspot.com/2010/08/alkyl-cyanoacrylate-adhesives.html

My purpose in posting this however is not to show my advanced ability to cut-and-paste other people’s science knowledge, but to mention that one article stated that the cyanoacrylate polymer is rather brittle and that usually a plasticizer is added to the adhesive formulation. Perhaps the failure of some cyanoacrylate joints is from gradual loss of the plasticizer from the cured adhesive?

[Andy Stockton]

jgmotamedi has posted in the past about having used some acrylic/plexiglas in his fuming boxes. This post from a year ago has some discussion although the links to the pictures are now broken.

http://www.cdags.org/dagforum/topic.php?id=215

He may have the longest term experience on longevity of plastic unless someone else chimes in. For what it is worth my acrylic and teflon box has been charged with iodine for about six months. It has gotten little use unfortunately, but I looked it over recently and the plastic has no visible signs of deterioration and the seal continues to be adequate.

I was also interested in your comment on CA glue failure. I did some web searching on the woodworking forums and saw a lot of divided opinions on the issue. Some saying they had no such problems and others contending the glue fails with age. Have you experienced failures? I suppose all glues fail eventually, perhaps these failures are related to varying product formulations or perhaps other factors like cleanliness of the joint or moisture and such?

Andy

[Andy Stockton]

Thanks photolytic – I am looking forward to the day I finally have enough time to fume “many tens of plates” much less being able to equal your “thousands”. Needless to say wearing out the plastic hasn’t been an issue yet. I couldn’t agree more that glass is the proven performer in fuming boxes. Nothing contains iodine and bromine better. I have experimented with alternate materials mostly because I find it fun. I started out with wanting to make a box with no metal at all since some early boxes I had suffered severe corrosion of their metal parts. The rest of the current design was the result of an over-active imagination.

So far the adhesion of the etched Teflon to the acrylic has been holding up. When I was in the initial design phase I glued two sample pieces together and after a twenty-four hour cure I was unable to separate them even with a knife blade and a lot of pressure. Since cyanoacrylate is an acrylic polymer I would imagine the bond on the acrylic side is a true weld. The particular glue mix I use was formulated by the company selling the etched Teflon specifically for strong adhesion to their product. The etching forms an anchor point for a mechanical bond as well as the glue supposedly having properties that allow some level of bonding with the Teflon. Of course as you point out degradation over time may occur, chemicals do break down.

The one issue that I have had with the etched Teflon is that it comes from the supplier with the non-etched surface a bit scratched and beat-up. I ended up sanding it to a pretty smooth state, but I don’t think it seals quite as well as a flat ground glass-glass joint. I don’t think it leaks much more than the boxes I had before however. If I put a piece of bare mild steel in with either box in an enclosed space, I see evidence of metal corrosion within a week. The plan for that is a plastic box to contain the plastic box. I also haven’t tested the bromine side of the box yet either. Robinson’s Quick – here I come.

On another note entirely, I have thought about making one of my double sliding boxes with glass liners in the boxes and a glass surface laminated to the lid. I just haven’t identified a suitable glue – although I have been thinking of doing a test with JB-Weld. I continue to be attracted to making my own boxes partly because I never seem to find existing glass containers that are exactly the shape and size I want. Fortunately this is a field where we are free to inflict weird idiosyncratic approaches on our selves at any time.

[Andy Stockton]

Hello Ty-

Here is a link to a useful chemical resistance of plastics chart.

http://k-mac-plastics.net/chemical-large.htm

You can find plastics that are resistant iodine and bromine. Those that are resistant to both are pretty spendy. In the cheaper realm acrylic does fine with Iodine (I currently have an acrylic iodine fuming box). On the Bromine side Type II PVC is supposed to work. I have not yet personally tested that although I have a box built. I have not charged it with bromine yet.

One thing you might consider is laminating Teflon to cheaper plastics. I have done that with acrylic and it works well and saves a lot of money. There is an etched Teflon sheet available that glues nicely with cyanoacrylate to acrylic. Because the sheet is quite thin it is much less expensive. 12x12x1/16th About $30

Here is a you-tube video of the Acrylic & PVC box I built a while back.

http://youtu.be/moUfrlAQGFw

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