Getting stupid in my dotage

I "developed" five rolls of HP5 last night, and thought I'd use up the last of my Microdol X. Developed, stopped, fixed, washed, dried (on the reels) and got five rolls of clear film. I suspect the powder in the plastic container labeled Microdol X wasn't. I'm sure the fixer was fixer. I must have put some leftover chemical in an empty box labeled microdol x and didn't change the label. Lucky my feet won't reach my ass.
Nothing real critical on the rolls, except I was expecting a few nice pictures out of the bunch. I hate it when you can't find someone else to blame. Wish I had an employee Even my dog is looking at me with soulful "get the paper bag" eyes.

THAT is one of the reasons I only develop 1 or maybe 2 rls @ a time. I just don't trust mixtures etc. This way I KNOW what I am doing with my spare time. One good thing is that your mistake wil NEVER happen again !!

Well, I use Rodinal and HC-110 currently. I used to use the Pyrocat-MC liquid kits from Photographers Formulary. They are labeled, and I don't reuse those containers. It may seem like a waste, but guess what - I have good developing chemistry every time.
The effort in exposing five rolls of 36-exposure film, or even five rolls of 120, is significant. It's a day's worth of work, and completely sucks and blows thinking that each of those rolls probably cost you in the vicinity of six bucks.
I have done what you did in the past, but it was exhausted developer that was the culprit. Rodinal and HC-110 don't really go bad if you use it wisely.

- Thomas

johnnywalker said:

I suspect the powder in the plastic container labeled Microdol X wasn't.

Click to expand...

I could just have easily been Xtol with sudden death syndrome.

I think the only way to be sure is to drop a snip of leader or paper into the developer before use to 'proof' the developer.

I, of course, always forget to do this.

Don't feel bad. We all screw up. Just the other day, I did a whole series of shots under studio strobes with my Mamiya C220. Forgot to set the flash sync from "M" to "X". Two blank rolls coming up. Stupid mistake. Oh well.

Have to consider some way of locking that sync lever in place.