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  #11  
Old 26th March 2015, 02:56 PM
Richard Gould Richard Gould is offline
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Yes that is the great thing about Firstcall, they do care about customer satisfaction, I have used them for a few years now, then I started going to Silverprint because they had the film I like, Fomapan, and it was just as easy to add the extras to the order, but with the problems I have had I phoned an order, Monday, and the young lady who anserwed the Phone actually said that she remembered me from 2 years ago, and they still had my details in the system, the phone was anwsred within 2 rings, and they are so helpful, so, apart from Film,I will go to them in future, as regard film, they do have some reasonably priced, the Rollei range is pretty good, and they still have some colour film priced pretty fairly, they just don't stock my Fomapan, it is the Ilford/Kodak range that is expensive, but then, it is expensive full stop, and they do keep a great range of chemicals and other analogue stuff, one of the biggest ranges around
Richard
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  #12  
Old 26th March 2015, 03:21 PM
Tom Kershaw Tom Kershaw is offline
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I've ordered Kodak film from Silverprint & Ag Photographic in the past. 7dayshop can be good for Kodak if you only want a small amount of film.

Tom
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  #13  
Old 26th March 2015, 03:41 PM
Richard Gould Richard Gould is offline
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7day shop was not that for me when it was located in Guernsey, I have ordered from them and they have taken a week to Deliver, and I have ordered from AG, the problem with AG, for me, is you have to order on line, they never answer the phone these days, and having lost a lot of money though on line ordering it once bitten twice shy, if I can't order by phone then I don't order, Silverprint were pretty good, but have gone down hill lately, For film I find Process Supplies to be pretty good, prices not to bad, and they stock Fomapan, also Morco are very good indeed and a little cheaper for all film than most, so we have plenty of choice, my last film order was Process, ordered around 4 P.M. and was here next, by post, so that was pretty good,
Richard
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  #14  
Old 26th March 2015, 06:10 PM
Tom Kershaw Tom Kershaw is offline
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I've used Morco in the past and found them efficient; and should think about trying Process Supplies in the future. I also prefer to order photo supplies via the telephone, apart from anything else it gives a good opportunity to check whether something is in stock.

Tom
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  #15  
Old 26th March 2015, 06:36 PM
Richard Gould Richard Gould is offline
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Process supplies film prices are certainly on a par with Silverprint, are again are very friendly and helpful, as Morco always were, and for film Morco are a little bit cheaper than most, another great place for Ilford and KodaK film, and again very helpful and available on the phone, with very keen prices, are Mathers, there are others, but these are the dealers I have dealt with, thinking about it, in these days, we are pretty well served for our supplies,
Richard
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  #16  
Old 26th March 2015, 06:44 PM
KevinAllan KevinAllan is offline
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I had a look at the description of the Firstcall developer a few weeks ago when the developer was mentioned on theonlinedarkroom.com

The words used in the description are almost word-for-word identical to those used for Rollei RHS D74-DC ( see http://www.firstcall-photographic.co...eloper-1-litre ) which sells for £13.27


I can't find that article from theonlinedarkroom now, but the author Bruce / Brock is a member here so he might pop up.
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  #17  
Old 26th March 2015, 06:58 PM
Richard Gould Richard Gould is offline
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Kevin, I am 99.9% certain that the Firstcall chemistry is re branded Rollei, certainly the bottles that it comes in is the same, and if it is then it is made by Compard, which is tne new name for the Agfa chemical maker, I understand that it was a management buy out of one of the Agfa chemical plant's, and if so the quality will be second to none,
Richard
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  #18  
Old 26th March 2015, 07:38 PM
Mike O'Pray Mike O'Pray is offline
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Well we seem to have moved a long way from the original post. My only worry about the developer that Tom mentioned is the lack of info on it and I take it that no-one so far has anything to add to the sparse info that is contained on the Firstcall pdf.

Are there any chemists in the house who might have useful info to add.

The dilution ratios are clearly not those of Rodinal( not dilute enough) but equally clearly are more than ID11/D76, DDX, Xtol etc and the developer appears to be OK for anything from the slowest to the fastest film with some amazingly fast times(as low as 3 mins), although interestingly there is no info for it for Rollei films which might just mean that no dev info exists for Rollei films rather than it isn't suitable. The label suggests 5 mins for FP4 at 1+15 but the Firstcall narrative says 5.5 mins at 1+12. It seems to be "all over the place" as they say.

It looks as if a telephone conversation with Firstcall might be required. At the very least it might clarify the agitation pattern. Simply stating 30 secs isn't very helpful.

Mike
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  #19  
Old 26th March 2015, 08:58 PM
Richard Gould Richard Gould is offline
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Mike. if you follow Kevin's link above he is, I believe, correct in that almost word for word it follows that the firstcall developer is the same as the Rollei, and I think that, if the other products in the range are anything to go by, the instructions will be very comprehensive on the bottle, Certainly looking at the picture on the wedsite and in the catalogue their is a comprehensive list of films and their developing times, so if anyone wants to try it, and orders from Firstcall, a fiver for what looks a very good developer is not a lot of cash,
Richard
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  #20  
Old 26th March 2015, 10:54 PM
Mike O'Pray Mike O'Pray is offline
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Richard I started my post then had a break for the evening meal, finished the post and replied only to find that as you say Kevin had added useful info.

I agree it is almost certainly Rollei RHS D74-DC. which helps a lot. I did more research based on this and it would seem that the Xtol agitation regime might be appropriate. It seems that DC stands for "double concentrate" which suggests that if the Firstcall developer is the same then 1+15 is probably the most appropriate dilution for most if not all films

There are examples of various films, but not all, being developed in RHS D74-DC but it is difficult to know if the results are worse, as good or better than say Xtol.

Interestingly there are comments elsewhere on the Rollei instructions/times being wrong and given this, we cannot really expect Firstcall to improve on the maker's instructions

Equally interesting is that Firstcall does not gives times for Rollei films when this developer would appear to be the same as the Rollei developer.

I wonder if Firstcall has avoided such info in order not to antagonise Rollei, given how much cheaper the Firstcall developer is.

As an example of what I regard as sensible entrepreneurship Firstcall appears or did appear to sell TMax 135 cassette as its own (using TMax bulk rolls?) much cheaper than Kodak.

It looks as if it has done the same with a Rollei developer

Mike
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