X-tol dillutions

[justin_fullmer]

Hi everyone,

I just bought a packet of Kodak x-tol developer and went to Digitaltruth to get proccessing times. My question is what is the benifit of dilluting it to such long developing times? Is there an increase in grain and contrast or does this control that somehow?

Thanks!!

[chuck_albertson]

I can't speak for all films, but I've had really good results with

HP5+ developed in Xtol 1:3, better than in stock Xtol or 1:1. The

grain is really fine, but the sharpness is excellent, too.

[john_hicks]

Beware that you should use at least 100ml stock Xtol per roll no matter what dilution you use.

[marc_leest5]

Technically spoken, XTOL is a fine grain developer, and a mediocre

acutance developer. You can change things by adding dilution, grain

will increase (a little bit) but acutance will get A LOT better.

I have had the shapest results on XTOL 1:3 with Delta 100.

Even with higher dilutions might be expermented with, for low

contrast and compensating development on document films as Tech Pan.

Also a little bit increase of real speed will be observed, and last

but not least it's very economical !

[ed_hurst]

There seems to be a consensus developing that Xtol's tendency

to "fail" (lose potency suddenly and unpredictably) has been ironed

out. Would higher dilutions increase the chances of the failure?

[tim_brown5]

Xtol diluted 1+2 and 75F is my favorite compromise for speed, grain,

acutance and development time.

[paul swenson]

I would highly encourage you to go to Kodak's website and read the

data posted there regarding X-tol, dilutions, storage. Many of the

above concerns are addressed there. Developing times are posted for

many of the common films, including Ilford, Agfa and others.

[pete_caluori]

Greetings,

 

<p>

 

The information of Kodak's WEB site no longer gives data for

dillutions above 1:1. Older data on their site used to list data for

1:3 dillutions, but they removed it because people were complaining

of under development. I believe Kodak now recommends a minimum of

200 ml per roll (36x35) or 4 sheets of 4x5. At 1:3 that's a total of

800 ml of solution which is quite a bit for most 35 mm tanks.

 

<p>

 

Regards,

[sal_santamaura]

Ed, yours is only the second post I've seem that claims rectification

of Xtol's "failure" problems. Where's the concensus?

[jimvanson]

Kodak states _you must_ use at least 100mls of stock XTOL per 80

square inches of film (one roll of 35mm or 120). I use at least

125mls of stock. Since XTOL was released I've probably processed

enough film to have used 50 5 Liter packages of the developer. And

none of those packages have caused me any grief! I still use 1+3

dilutions as often as I can. I dilute because of increased sharpness,

increased film speed and economy! Maybe my sucess is due to the fact

that I'm using _at least_ 125mls. of stock per unit, or that the

stock is never more then a few weeks old, maybe it's the 5 Liter

packages or it could be it's the good mountain water up here in

Vancouver that I use to mix the developer with. Regardless I'll

continue to use dilute XTOL following the spec's in Kodak's April

1998 Technical Data Sheet...jim

[anders_ocklind]

X-tol: When I develop PanFplus I use only 75ml/film. Excellent result.