Formula for WD2D+?

[edbuffaloe]

According to the folks at Photographer's Formulary, they are selling a new improved version of the Wimberley WD2D formula. They sent me some to test, but what I really want to know is how does this formula differ from the old one? I know the original formula specified benzotriazole, and various people have recommended that it be omitted. WD2D is very similar to PMK, except it uses sodium carbonate instead of sodium metaborate as the alkaline agent.

 

[William Levitt]

Hi Ed,

I've substituted sodium carbonate for sodium metaborate in the PMK formula with great suscess. In fact I prefer it to the metaborate. The substitution was out of necessity, and I used 60% of the total amount (in grams) of metaborate. Sorry it's hard to explain.

Example: formula calls for 100g metaborate.....I used 60g carbonate.

 

[edbuffaloe]

I've since examined the data sheet that comes with the Photographer's Formular WD2D+ developer. It lists the ingredients, but not the quantities. The only difference I can find from the earlier formula is the elimination of the benzotriazole and the addition of EDTA, Tetrasodium Salt to stock solution A. I would imagine that it is added in a quantity of 2 to 5 grams.

 

[edbuffaloe]

I received an e-mail from John Wimberley stating that the WD2D+ formula is proprietary and is optimized for use with variable contrast papers. I hope it's good for other work too, since I hardly ever use variable contrast papers.

 

[Jorge]

Anybody wants a formula I deviced for WD2D rollo e mail me and I will send you the formula. The results are beautiful green negs, less yellow than with ABC or PMK.

 

[edbuffaloe]

I developed some film in WD2D+ this weekend. The times were very close to those for PMK. All negs had a much greener stain than I see with PMK. A couple of the 8x10 negs didn't wash evenly (they floated to the top) and consequently had uneven stain. Times were 16 minutes for new Delta 400 roll film (EI 320) at 68 degrees, 12 minutes for T-Max 100 8x10 (EI 50) at 67 degrees, and 15 minutes for Classic Pan 400 8x10 (EI 200) at 67 degrees. I haven't printed any of them yet, but they scanned well.

 

[MtMan]

The Mar-Apr edition of " Photo Techniques has the article by John
Wimberley. It lists ingredients, times, directions and precautions. Well worth picking up.

Carl