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Ilford Delta 3200 souped in Microdol X ??


Andrew in Austin

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I bought a marked down packet of Microdol X over the summer that was

near its sell by date. Now as it is even nearer to that date, I've

decided to use it.

 

I have four rolls of Ilford Delta 3200 120 to develop. The box for the

120 recommends 13 minutes @ 68 degrees at a 1+0 dilution, i.e. stock

solution for an EI of 1600.

 

To cut to the chase, are the Ilford recommended times accurate for

this developer? I like doing single inversions at 1 minute intervals

with a wrist swirl at the 30 second interval.

 

Also, Kodak only recommends 4 rolls per litre of Microdox X before it

is spent. Am I pushing my luck try to do 4 rolls of 120?

Best Regards - Andrew in Austin, TX
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Andrew, I've never used the combination you're considering, but it seems a strange choice. Microdol is well known to give fine grain at the expense of 1 stop or so, of film speed. Not recommended for push processing, which is essentially what you'd have to do to get an EI of 1600 out of Delta 3200, which has an actual speed of around 1000, suggesting that an EI of 500 might be more realistic for the combination. At EI 500, you might well prefer a 400 speed film like Tri-X or HP5+ in Microphen or Diafine. Good luck.
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I have to agree with Jay; Microdol X (and the similar ILFORD PERCEPTOL) give a natural speed LOSS. They are not very good at push-processing (which you are doing with the Delta 3200, even when rating at 1600), unless you are looking for fairly high contrast. Even then, the negatives will be lacking in shadow detail, more so than with other developers.

 

As far as the capacity, a 120 roll is the same amount of film as a 36 exposure 35mm, so no problem there. But the developer does not have enough activity to support going to 1+1, at least not without extremely long times.

 

I'd recommend using a developer with some speed enhancement. My top choice would be ILFOTEC DD-X, but MICROPHEN, Xtol, and T-Max all give good results.

 

David Carper

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