1st Lith print experience

I printed my first "lith" prints yesterday and di not get what I had envisioned.
The print had a very warm and creamy color but that was all???? I used two different papers, Adox MCC-110 and Fomabrom Variant IV 123, with very similar results. Also the prints took about 40 minutes to develop????
I was expecting the infectious development, once it started, to go rapidly but even after it started it was very slow.

I was using Moersch Easy Lith, 20A + 20B + 1000.

Is it possible for you to scan and show us the examples?

In my experience, once the image begins to form in the developer, you can double that time to figure out when full blacks will appear. That is, if it takes around 4 minutes for the image to begin to appear, then I will probably be happy with the blacks by the 8-minute mark. This is just a generalization, as a lot depends on the print and paper, but having developed around 500 sheets (of mostly Foma paper) in Moersch EasyLith and SE5 lith, this is what I've noticed. Do you remember when you first noticed the development start? The only time I had something like what you described happen was using Fuji's Fujibro paper (30-60 min of development) at 'normal' developer temperatures (around 20 C). When I used hot lith (over 30 C) the development times were reduced to 5-10 minutes. Try keeping your dilution the same next time, but increase the temperature and see if that helps.

I am not familiar with EasyLith (I use Rollei and Arista liquid), but I tried the Adox with no success and got results very similar to what you seem to be getting. Fomabrom Variant fiber has the strongest infectious development I've seen, but it takes forever (like 10-15 minutes!) to develop and the colors are muted. I develop in hot developer (float developing tray in a larger tray of hot water). I suspect that Fomabrom would take 40 minutes in cold developer. In the other current lith thread there is a wonderful example of what a Fomabrom lith print usually looks like in my experience.

Maybe you underexposed???

Jaap Jan

My experience with first time lith printers stradibarrius is that they quite often initially snatch the print from the dev when they see a mid tone and assume it is a black. It can be deceptive in safe light conditions when you first try and don't know exactly what you are looking at.
This gives exactly the appearance that you describe, but it would be helpful if you could post a scan.

A red safelight torch makes this very much easier to judge correctly.

You would probably also find it easier, when starting, to use a stronger brew - say 50 + 50 to 1000. then change dilution according to the sort of result you are looking for.

Stay with it
Tim