Advice on use of chemicals for Paterson Multi-Reel 5

[Thomas Matthew]

Hi there, I recently acquired a Paterson Multi-Reel 5 and believe that 1.5L of chemicals are required in order to develop 5 x 135 reels. I have mixed 1L of my Fuji X-Press 5L and here's my question: If I were to mix another 1L and used both bottles in the Multi-Reel, would there be an issue? Would using seperately mixed 1Ls affect the development or the chemicals when they're back in storage? Any advice greatly appreciated!

 

[Donald Qualls]

My Paterson 2- and 3-reel tanks have the solution requirements molded into the bottom of the tank. It calls for 290 ml for each 35mm reel, 370 for 127, and 500 for each 120. Therefore, five reels at the 35mm setting should require 1450 ml to cover.

If you haven't used the first liter of color developer yet, there should be no problem in mixing a second liter and combining the two. I wouldn't suggest trying to store two separate 1L bottles -- especially if you're shooting enough to need to process 5 rolls at a time (instead of 3 rolls, which takes less than a liter, followed by another batch of two); just combine the two and keep track of usage like you usually would, but have twice as many rolls before exhaustion becomes significant.

On the other hand, if your first liter has been used for one or more rolls already, I wouldn't recommend combining it with a fresh liter, as you'll wind up with an untested situation. It's probably not global disaster level, perhaps not even as bad as mixing fresh and partially used battery cells in a device, but it's much more sensible if you have used chemistry with some life left to use partial capacity in your tank (or a smaller tank, like a 2-reel or 3-reel) and use up your existing batch before mixing more. Takes a little longer -- getting the reels fully dry takes the longest, but you apparently have five reels, you can just put the wet ones aside and use dry ones when you run the second batch.

If your kit uses separate bleach and fixer, they probably have much higher capacity than the color developer anyway, so you should be okay mixing fresh with partly used as long as you keep track of your roll count. For blix, I'll flip back to recommending not mixing new and used -- blix is internally conflicted anyway, nothing much gained by adding to that.

 

[Bormental]

@Thomas Matthew I wouldn't think that would be a problem. I have this tank and regularly have to do similar gymnastics as my developer is stored in smaller bottles.

However, looks like you're doing C41 here. To share my experience, I had a hard time keeping consistent temperatures in that tank. It's just too large, so it takes a lot longer to pour liquids in and out, and the temperature drop is harder to control. I've had identical films show color differences when developed in it at the same time between bottom-vs-top reels. So I stopped and I use it only for B&W now.