@Alan Johnson What is the Base+fog like on these metaborate variants? One of the things that is much better with PC-512 Borax vs PC-Glycol is that it has basically no worse fog than most commercial developers. I had attributed that in part to the pH difference.
Hey everyone, I went mostly silent here for a year... life caught up. But early last year while working on two bath developers I ended up with a formula that I liked a lot for a single bath developer. It's not revolutionary at all, but I have been using it a lot and really like the results. You might, too, so I wrote up a post about it on my blog:
A Simple Phenidone/Vitamin C Concentrate Developer: PC-512 Borax
What follows is how I formulated a very nice developer that I have now used pretty much exclusively for the last year and a half. As it says in the title, I have called it “PC-512 Borax”. Creative name? No. But it is indicative of the formula. This nice developer is a secondary result of some...imager.ie
It's a developer in the family of PC-Glycol. I have used that developer a lot and this one gives me substantially better results. It also has a much better Dmin than PC-Glycol, about 0.3 for Delta 100.
Here are some photos I developed with it (Delta 100)
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@Alan Johnson What is the Base+fog like on these metaborate variants? One of the things that is much better with PC-512 Borax vs PC-Glycol is that it has basically no worse fog than most commercial developers. I had attributed that in part to the pH difference.
The gold standard...
PCM20 [and probably HC-110] do not work with microfilm type films to give pictorial contrast,
Dilute more. I've used HC-110 at 1+127 on Imagelink and Fuji microfilms at EI 25 with good results.
I will have another try
Alan, thank you for performing this experiment! I wanted to try modifying my Mocon developer like this, but eventually forgot about it. PCM20 is roughly the same formula as Mocon, but with no sulfite and about 1/4 as much ascorbic acid.
Mocon concentrate showed no deterioration (yellowing, or crystallisation, or separation) after years when kept frozen. At room temperature, it began yellowing after about six months.
However, in my article on Mocon, I mention that a major factor in crystallisation or separation is the ratio of metaborate to ascorbic acid. I found that a solution is stable for a ratio up to around 0.4 or 0.5. Above that, the concentrate collapsed after a week or two at room temperature. The ratio of PCM20 is 20/12 = 1.67, which is far above 0.5. On the plus side, the overall concentration is lower, so perhaps it will be stable. I suggest watching the room-temperature concentrate for a few weeks. Any crystals or smoke-like white wisps indicate failure. Even if it fails at room temperature, it might last a long time if kept frozen, so I suggest also keeping a bottle in the freezer.
Mark
It is rather disappointing to find that after 12 weeks crystals have appeared in the PCM10 storage sample and a lesser amount in the PCM20 (pic). These may be metaborate as the ratio 1.67 is greater than 0.4-0.5.
The sample of PCM20 I am using is only 4 weeks old and has no crystals, I will carry on unless there seems a better idea.
It is rather disappointing to find that after 12 weeks crystals have appeared in the PCM10 storage sample and a lesser amount in the PCM20 (pic). These may be metaborate as the ratio 1.67 is greater than 0.4-0.5.
The sample of PCM20 I am using is only 4 weeks old and has no crystals, I will carry on unless there seems a better idea.
Attached a pic on a light box of Delta 400 developed in HC-110, DCM18 and replenished Xtol. I don't see a problem with base +fog using Metaborate in Glycol, at least with Dimezone-s.
This looks a lot like the clarity of xtol. Very precise realistic representation of highlists mids and shadows.
I really like it.
It is rather disappointing to find that after 12 weeks crystals have appeared in the PCM10 storage sample and a lesser amount in the PCM20 (pic). These may be metaborate as the ratio 1.67 is greater than 0.4-0.5.
The sample of PCM20 I am using is only 4 weeks old and has no crystals, I will carry on unless there seems a better idea.
The two shown in the pic, post 409 are kept to see what happens if the developer concentrate is just left in store so I will leave them to see if/how the crystals grow. They were clear when made up. Maybe eventually they could be re-heated to see if the crystals re-dissolve.
For a few days before the crystals were noticed the temperature dropped by about 15F to 55F.It is surprising that the PCM10 is most affected. My conclusion so far is that the occurrence of these crystals means that this glycol mix is likely to be of interest only to a few hobbyists who have a quantity of metaborate, most people would be better off mixing @relistan's formula for 512 Borax.
For actual use I have a separate mix of PCM20, not the storage samples illustrated. After 4 weeks this is still clear.
With Ilford Delta 100 the time from the massive development chart for HC-110 1+47 is 7.5 min 20C. Here I used 7 m 20C for contrasty subjects with PCM20 1+47.
John, one month since post 409 the PCM20 storage sample looks unchanged with just a few crystals .Originally it was made up on 13 Nov, post 402. So far PCM20, which is the original formula of @relistan, seems to have the closest times to HC-110 and is my preferred mix.
I am actually using a PCM20 sample which was made up 2 months ago , this is very light straw color and free of crystals.
If the storage sample lasts for a year PCM20 could be worthwhile for home brewing as all the effort is in the original mixing and after it is made up it is simply measured out one shot with a 10ml syringe. Maybe for this small grain size its rivals will be high sulfite developers that require filtering to remove deposited silver on re-use.
Alan, have you tried pushing films in DCM18 or PCM 20? I would like to try, but am not very confident doing so. Kindly give me tips for developing TriX 400 (35mm) @ 800 ISO, I would try DCM 18 following those.
Sidd, I have not tried pushing with either of these. However, I note that the massive development chart gives 6.5-8 min for HC-110 dilution E , 1+47, 20C EI=400 [and 10m 23C for EI=800 seems unlikely to me].
I would start by trying 8m 20C with DCM18, at least the highlights should not be blown out, maybe some kind of test.
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