Developing modern films in Kodak DK60A

[Down Under]

In another post, I recently wrote about Kodak's DK60A developer, and commented I believe this is a forgotten and possibly underrated developer.

It was popular in the 1950s and 1960s as a general purpose developer for the films of that era. The formula is available and can easily be mixed from raw chemistry. Also the replenisher. I used both in my time (early to late 1960s) and it served its purpose well until I moved on to two bath developers and then to Kodak D76 and Xtol. Negatives I processed during that long ago time enlarge well and show very little grain, but I am unsure if this is due to the developer or the films.

I am now thinking about mixing up a liter or two for the sake of nostalgia and to play with in my home darkroom. I still have a large stock of Kodak Panatomic-X in my freezer, also some quite old TMax of both speeds and a few dozen 120 Rollei films.

I did post something about DK60A some years ago. Got a few comments but did not follow up. I will look up all the old threads I can find and see what information I can get from them.

Has anyone used this for modern films such as TMax and other films?

I would be interested in comments from anyone who has used it or still uses it, or am I the only one?

 

[relistan]

I found this recipe "on the Internet" for this developer. Hopefully this is right.

Metol 2.5g
Sodium sulfite 50g
Hydroquinone 2.5g
Sodium metaborate 20g
Potassium bromide 0.5g

That's going to be a fair bit grainier and probably a bit sharper than D-76 due to the lower amount of sulfite and higher pH, and with the metaborate the pH is high enough to activate the hydroquinone, so I would imagine that the contrast might be higher than D-76. However, there is only half as much hydroquinone, and since metol is softer working, that might even out the contrast. The 0.5g bromide will slow the activity down so times are probably not far off D-76 times. Not an expert, but those are my guesses from looking at it. @michael_r would be better at analyzing it that me I am sure.

 

[relistan]

Hmm that formula may in fact be DK-50. YMMV.

 

[Down Under]

I again checked my ancient notes - all written in blue-black Parker ink with my venerable Parker 51 bought in 1964 and which I still have and use. Just sayin'.

Anyway, I made many comments back then about almost everything. Next to a date I recorded as having with a gal who was our high school cheerleader and later married the local attorney who became the mayor of my home town and eventually got removed from the bar for being too self-generous with his client's trust fund, all local prehistory now. As for films, I processed everything for 7.5 minutes 2 20C and Tri-X of HP3 for 11 minutes at 20C. Yep, contrast. Heaps of it. Also good mid tones. But those negatives still print just fine.

Not much grain pattern to be noticed but on 120 film it isn't a big issue anyway.

Out of interest, I also found the formula for the two bath developer I used from I think, 1967. In a column in Amateur Photographer by one Ron Spillman. He noted it worked well with the Ilford films of that time. The negatives I still have from this brew also turned out fine and print well. So I may try it with new emulsions as well.

Fun to go back in time. I have another notebook I kept from 1970 until I moved across oceans to Australia in the mid-'70s. I will be looking thru this one soon. More deja vu. It all reads like ancient history now but it's fun to go back and remember.