What could be the issue with my negatives?

This is all so great, really a nice start to get me back in touch with film. I was recently pulled into the office at the paper as an editor after shooting for some time and I'm feeling like I have a photography deficiency. (HaHa!) I decided what better to get back into then to hone my skills back with film. So I'm hoping that it just just be my shitty handling of exposure. Dummy.

Some questions I will raise, I sometimes use a 3 reel paterson tank, sometimes a 2 reel. From what I've been researching I don't really have to change developing times due to the tank size do I? I see that Kodak recommends if you have a large tank 1/2 gallon - 3 1/2 you have to but with the tanks I have I always just doubled the amount of developer and processed box time. As a side note I will be experimenting with possibly exposing for 320, I never heard that 400 wasn't true speed of the film.

Anyway, I made new fixer just to, well, freshen it up, and fixed a strip with no change as some had expected.

I can't say again how much I appreciate the help, keep the convo going with any more tips or any helpful reference links!

The large tanks also have different agitation times. It seems that solution moves around differently.

Otherwise, some high dilution developers need more time and/or higher volume.

(That latter means a large tank with less than a full reel load.)