A Tale of Two Xtols

[Joel Alpers <joel.alpers@xxxxxxxxxxx>]

Greetings, HIExperts!

Many thanks to those who offered suggestions recently for 
a starting EI for HIE in XTOL 1:1, and W.J. for his filter
clarification (R60/R2 == 25A) for me!

I've been off trying out suggestions, and have some
(hopefully) interesting experiences to report.


If you recall, on my first roll, I was metering NOT
through the 25A filter, and getting an effective EI
of about 25.

I then shot a second roll, this time metering THROUGH
the 25A filter. I shot at 250,100,50,and 25.

To my surprise, the shots at EI25 were still the
closest (though all were a bit thin)!!! This couldn't
be!

I began to suspect my XTOL. I've read on rec.photo.darkroom
that XTOL, as it ages, can fairly suddenly begin to give
underevelped results. Was it possible that my XTOL was "fading", 
perhaps even between these two rolls (several days apart)?

I checked the dates, and I mixed this XTOL up in 10/98 - 
about 6 months old.

So as a check, I did one more test roll, at EI's of 200,
100, 50, 25, and 12. This time I developed in fresh D76 1:1,
and voila! Much more to expectations, the 200 looked
about "right" (i.e. similar to a standard b/w film).


Now, this is not to condemn XTOL as an HIE developer;
I just think mine has gotten a bit too old, so I'm going
to dump it. And for now, I'll just stick to D76 for
my HIE testing.


Along that line, does anyone have any D76 1:1 suggestions
for a development time? I've checked the Kodak data I can
find, and all I find are times for undiluted stock solution
(11 min @ 68f/20c). I estimated a time based on other films
that Kodak -does- give 1:1 times for, and used 14 minutes.

Any better ideas?

Again, my thanks to all on this list for your helpfulness!!!

Joel.
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