Albumen prints low density

[kevin klein]

What can cause a low density albumen print? Lately My prints have not had as good density after processing, they are fading in the final wash too. The initial exposed print is more reddish brown instead if a dark to very dark brown and no bronzing in the deepest shadow areas. Could it be old paper or a wrong preportion of silver? I am brush coating the silver with a solution of 100ml water, 20% silver, 10% citric acid. Maybe the ammonium chloride % needs to be changed?

 

[koraks]

What can cause a low density albumen print?

Some possibilities:
Insufficient exposure
Suboptimal salt/silver ratio
Excessive use of restrainer in sensitizer (citric acid)
Bleaching during processing (particularly fixing)

Your posts imply that the problem wasn't there to begin with. The obvious question then is: what have you changed?

 

[kevin klein]

That's just it, everything is being done the same as usual. Some times problems just happen, but finding the cause is the answer.

 

[nmp]

That's the nature of the beast....it's called "process creep." Even though we think we didn't change anything, something that we thought was not important changed slowly and all of a sudden the results are the not the same anymore.

If all the usual suspects have been eliminated, I would start with temperature and humidity. Those two are the most difficult to keep constant unless one has a super-duper environmentally-controlled darkroom. But not knowing exact details of the problem and the circumstances, anything more definitive would be a wild conjecture.