I had the opportunity to read the densities of a couple of 8X10 negatives that Jim Shanesy sent me. Both were Efke PL 100 film. One was developed in ABC Pyro and the other was developed in Pyrocat. I read both the visual and blue channel densities of these negatives. The results were as follows:
ABC Pyro High value density (visual) 1.77 (blue channel) 1.92
Density attributable to proportional stain .15
Pyrocat High value density (visual) 1.51 (blue channel) 1.73
Density attributable to proportional stain .21
Donald,
This is consistent with my comparison of ABC Pyro and Pyrocat-HD negatives. For some reason I forgot to put in my article an ABC Pyro curve that showed Visual, Blue and UV as I did for PMK, Rollo Pyro and WD2D+, but I may go back and add it now.
What we can say is that ABC Pyro is a staining developer but it produces very little stain. That is probably the main reason it gives prints with such large grain (in comparison to PMK, Rollo Pyro and Pyrocat-HD) -- there is not enough stain to achieve any grain masking.