If the problem with your silver nitrate solution indeed is
a milky white-ish precipitate, then you can be reasonably sure
what you are seeing is silver chloride, which itself is
moderately light-sensitive (everyone else help me out on this
one; what would the presence of some silver chloride do to
a kallitype print? ). Since silver nitrate is very soluble,
decanting or filtering the solution to remove the milkiness will
not result in any appreciable (or even negligible ) loss of
silver nitrate. If it makes you feel better I did the same
just last weekend with tap water, noted the milky results
myself, and found the reference to silver chloride on Monday.
I am really no expert, but it is really interesting two people
tried the same thing at the same time.. anyway I digress.
I don't know much about ferric oxalate, but when I contacted
my chemist person he said that 1) it was very expensive, 2) it
is *nasty stuff* and told me under no circumstances not to
brethe it, and 3) it isn't available in our area (Tulsa, Oklahoma
USA). So a word of caution, I heard it is not a nice chemical.
Chico Seay
cseay@tublue.pa.utulsa.edu