aine,
extenders are added to the ink for the purpose of stretching the expensive ink with a cheaper material and for thinning and extending the working time of the ink. as such they do nothing to speed up the drying. rather they make the drying time much slower…. add enough and you won’t live long enough to see the ink dry. if you want it to dry faster, don’t add an extender…. sorta of like drinking a bottle of scotch and complaining about it making you drunk.

adding driers does speed the drying time. cobalt drier can make it such that the ink is dry to a light touch in an hour or two and completely dry in 24 hours. i started using cobalt naphthenate as a drier over thirty five years ago. i’ve never seen or heard of it yellowing the paper, nor did i see any mention of it in the article you referrenced. it does cause yellowing of light colored inks and pigments… but as it’s a very powerful oxidizer i’m sure if you were to use too much of it anything is possible. for the type and size printing most of us do you shouldn’t use more than a couple of drops of cobalt drier. about twenty years ago i began using tributyl tin as a mildicide to prevent mold and mildew and by accident found it to be the most powerful drier. again only tiny amounts are needed. both the tin and cobalt compounds are very nasty materials and should be used with extreme caution. no reason not to use them, just do so with care.

bridog… two things burnt plate oil isn’t or i should say wasn’t for several hundred years a petroleum material…. just plain old vegetable oil (linseed oil)
and there’s no such thing as a non-toxic cobalt drier by it’s very nature if it contains cobalt it’s both toxic and a carcinegin. and if it doesn’t have cobalt like the replacement driers then it’s not cobalt drier. i hate it when places want to use and play off the name of known, respected and well liked and used products…. maybe we should change the name of scotch… rename it “water” that way we could all take a bottle of water to work and make the day go better…. then what could they do, make it against the rules to drink water????
mike

But Mike, think of the benefits “What’s in the container? Just a little water, officer”…

I found this page with links to material safety data sheets (MSDS) specific for printmaking and manufacturer, I do have to say some of these do not contain all the info I like to see in an MSDS. I didn’t see one for GC “non-toxic Cobalt Drier” however I suspect it can be found on the GC website.

http://apps.risd.edu/envirohealth/msds.asp?oID=Printmaking

Nope I am wrong GC’s website didn’t list non-toxic cobalt drier unless I missed it and didn’t seem to publish MSDS sheets.

Nope I am wrong GC’s website didn’t list non-toxic cobalt drier unless I missed it and didn’t seem to publish MSDS sheets.

Barb
The product number is 13570 Cobalt Drier and is listed under the general category of ink but is found under the sub category labelled conditioners and modifiers and is listed about halfway down in the list of products.
I had to hunt around for my user name and password for the GC user forum as it has been quite a while and couldn’t remember it. I thought I would go right to the source..ask the owner of the company who is in the forum and find out exactly what this product is made from. With concerns about safe and unsafe chemicals and such it might be good knowledge to post for everyone’s benefit. Seems there are a few printmakers who use their products so shouldn’t data be published as general info?

Aine…in my experience the modifier I added to ink (ez wipe) appears to dry at the same rate as the ink with the drier medium..so indeed dry to the touch anywhere from 2 – 24 hours after printing.

aine,
i guess i should have brought this up…. a bit too tired to think straight. i don’t think your problem with drying times is with the materials but rather a problem of where you live. with you being from dun pharlain you’ve got everything going against you…. humid and cool is putting it mildly. my family left the highlands after cullodon… lost too many clansmen and gillies there. so i know a little of the area…. the weather here in southern california is so much nicer but then most everything else is nicer in scotland……… i strongly suggest you build a drying cabinet. i made mine out of a metal cabinet, i bought used for ten dollars. i used a hole saw to cut 1.5 inch holes in the back corners of all the shelves and several in the top to aid in air circulation. i then installed a surface mount lamp socket on the bottom shelf and on the middle shelf…. they can be put off to one side so as to be out of the way. you just have to be careful not to put things against the bulbs…. put a good lab type thermometer on the top shelf… it takes a little trail and error to figure out what wattage bulbs to use…. try to get it so it will keep a constant 105 to 110 degrees F. i wouldn’t let it go past about 120 degrees F. for others living in warmer humid climates try 30 to 40 degrees F over the room temp…. it’s not just a higher heat but the heat changes the “relative” humidity. you will be amazed at what this will do for you. what would normally take 24 hours becomes 30 minutes, what would be days becomes overnight. it’s very little expense and you don’t have to mess with very toxic driers…. mine didn’t cost as much as a small bottle of cobalt drier……

i learned long ago that the “new” “improved” etc etc. really ment nothing more than…. “we found a way of making a cheaper product, which we will sell at an even higher price to the suckers that are making us rich”. if you need to use an extender to thin the oil based ink a drop or two of plain old boiled linseed oil works fine…. it’s really the same thing as the burnt plate oil. if you need something a bit thicker use stand oil… just linseed oil thats been heated longer…. these can work just as well as other new improved things and don’t put any hazardous solvents or other dangerous material into the mix. they also do little to change the drying times if you just use a drop or two… if you need to use more of a modifier than a couple drops then you got far more wrong to face than an inks thats too thick… the biggest mistake people make with ink is they start by putting out far too much onto their glass plate at a time and continue working it around with each inking of the printing plate…. this allows the ink to dry and get gummy. keep the ink exposed to the air to a minimum and you’ll find it works so much better. i’ve seen people take a half hour to ink a plate… for some reason they thought you had to roll it back and forth fifty times and in ten different directions. not a wonder they ended up with a sticky gummy plate that was so difficult to wipe. i’m not saying thats what your doing just that i’ve seen it all too often… ink fast and wipe fast and get into the press. thats the way you’ll not only find things work easier but also get more consistent results.
oh sorry for the rant… yes you can a little drier to an ink thats had an extender added to speed the drying.

barb… here’s another place for other rather useless msds… i don’t know how they get away with such in-complete sheets… micaprintmaking.com/msds

got to run
mike

barb,
we could start a whole new thread on the lying scum that miss use the msds to hide the hazards in the things they sell… i prefer not to do business with those…

your right about times where people don’t have the proper equipment for the job and make do with small rollers…. they aren’t hard things to make. maybe some people here could share the ways they make their own. i’ve always tried to make my own tools first off mine are most often of better quality and are properly suited for the job at hand. not to mention the amount of money saved.

again your right about the small fire hazard… but then anything can be a hazard if miss-used. but then i do suggest a metal cabinet. and the cheapest surface mount light fixtures are the old porcelian ones that won’t melt or cause other problems. you can always put the wire bulb protectors on or mount an open metal can around the bulb. my current cabinet has been up an running for about 12 years straight. but then i do also use it for drying other things… it stays carefully packed with rare exotic woods that i use for making my oval boxes and my threaded top and inlayed boxes. i found that one hundred watt light bulb keeps it at 105 to 110 year round. cheap way to speed things up greatly. if you think ink can be slow… some of the woods take five or more years to dry normally, with the cabinet i can speed that up to a couple of months. and yes barb some day i will show you some of my stuff… i know you keep asking but i just don’t come here to show things off, been doing it all for enough years i could care less what others think of my work. i come for the discussion of art and to try and help others. for me, long ago art became my life.
mike

bridog,
the reason there’s just a tiny amount of cobalt in the drier compound is that the material is so powerful only the tiniest amount is needed. give this a thought: if the cobalt compound is soluble in oils and solvents, then it’s also soluble in your skin oils making it nice and easy to be taken into your body. also many of the oils and solvents pass right thru most gloves, making their use pointless. please don’t run from the cobalt drier and try something less toxic. the very reason they work as a drier is that they are very active chemical compounds…. they all are nasty.

but the good thing about cancer is that it rarely does much to effect your life and work….. you go about your every day life with no problems at all up until the last part of stage four…..

why would someone call a cobalt containing drier non-toxic….. because thats what you all want!!!!!!! how often is the topic of non-toxic methods been brought up…. and how many times have i screamed those things everyone is using and calling non-toxic aren’t…. copper compounds are deadly and if you think ferric cloride is safe, just drink some… better an adult take the step and report back if able rather than wait for someones kid to drink some of that fruit juice? personally i find the thought of a dead child as a result of a stupid parent, relative or neighbor far more offensive than the mild sexual jokes i’ve used in the past to try a get peoples attention…. well now it would seem you got the proof in writing. those fine up-standing companies your buy from are scaming you… they have no regard to your health or that of your families. they will use little simple lies just so they can increase their sales and how many of you have fallen for the bull….
mike

mike