HC-110; Your Favorite Dilution?

RattyMouse · Mar 16, 2014

Yesterday I souped up some Acros in HC-110, but this time I used Dilution E (1:47). I did this because the development times in dilution B are for only 5 mins. Everyone seems to believe that the shorter the time, the less successful the development is, with 5 minutes being the bare minimum time needed for good, repeatable results. Since dilution E moved this time up to 7 mins, I figured that I would try it.

As it turned out, the negatives look great. 7 minutes at 20 C in 1:47 HC-110 works really well.

I'm amazed at how cost effective a developer HC-110 is. It is really easy to make dilutions with this concentrate. I paid $45 for a 1 liter bottle of concentrate and now with dilution E, I can develop 90 rolls of film with this liter!

Dilution E requires 10.4 mls of syrup. I think that I've read that some people even go leaner.

Anyone have experience with other dilutions?

NedL · Mar 16, 2014

I've been using dilution D for 135 and dilution E for 120. It is very economical and convenient!

Pioneer · Mar 16, 2014

I don't use HC110 as much as I used to but Dilution B is my favorite. As far as I can tell from my negatives anything at 5 min or over seems to work just fine. Of course, if someone is apt to become distracted while developing 30 seconds over of 5 minutes is a much higher change than 30 seconds over 12 minutes.

Auroraua · Mar 16, 2014

I am quite keen to try Dilution H.
Stand or semi stand dev.
There is a group on flickr
http://www.flickr.com/groups/hc-110/
That discusses different solutions.
I am also quite keen to try a teaspoon of Barry Thornton´s second bath.
https://www.flickr.com/groups/1924424@N22/discuss/72157629045003145/

Toffle · Mar 16, 2014

I generally use B for most roll films, except for really short development times, but in my Combiplan tank, which requires a large volume of developer relative to the film surface, I use H. Which ever dilution (or developer) you use, patient, consistent technique is the key. Usually when I find flaws in a film or print, it is because I have allowed myself to get too fast or sloppy in my work.

TareqPhoto · Mar 16, 2014

I am new to film world, and i am testing different developers even it is not the right way to do, but i ended up to buy HC-110 as a last developer to test, and i did give it a try but only with dil H, and it worked great for me, so i think i will keep using this dil for a while, one day i may test dil B and dil E and see how much difference i can see from dil H on same film.

Gerald C Koch · Mar 17, 2014

1+49 makes it easy to calculate how much is needed.

Jeff Kubach · Mar 17, 2014

When i use HC110 I use dil.B

Jeff

MattKing · Mar 17, 2014

RattyMouse said:
Yesterday I souped up some Acros in HC-110, but this time I used Dilution E (1:47). I did this because the development times in dilution B are for only 5 mins. Everyone seems to believe that the shorter the time, the less successful the development is, with 5 minutes being the bare minimum time needed for good, repeatable results. Since dilution E moved this time up to 7 mins, I figured that I would try it.

As it turned out, the negatives look great. 7 minutes at 20 C in 1:47 HC-110 works really well.

I'm amazed at how cost effective a developer HC-110 is. It is really easy to make dilutions with this concentrate. I paid $45 for a 1 liter bottle of concentrate and now with dilution E, I can develop 90 rolls of film with this liter!

Dilution E requires 10.4 mls of syrup. I think that I've read that some people even go leaner.

Anyone have experience with other dilutions?

Kodak's capacity recommendations extrapolate out to 6 mls of syrup per roll of 120/135-36/8x10 sheet.

So switch to rotary processing, put 300 ml of dilution E in your tank, and you are golden .

I use the 1+49 dilution, but I use it replenished with the HC-110 replenisher diluted to the dilution E concentration.

So I get about 160 rolls out of a litre, and don't have to worry about how much it takes to fill the tank.

Sadly, HC-110 replenisher is discontinued.

RattyMouse · Mar 17, 2014

Dilution E is waaay more than 6 mls of syrup per roll. It's 10.4 mls.

MattKing · Mar 17, 2014

RattyMouse said:
Dilution E is waaay more than 6 mls of syrup per roll. It's 10.4 mls.

Only if you need 600 ml to cover the film in your tank.

The amount of syrup necessary to develop a roll of film is independent of which dilution you use - it is 6 ml whether you use A, B, C, D, E, F, G or H.

The problem you will encounter though is that the volume of working solution you end up with is quite small with many of those dilutions - the film isn't completely covered in the tank when you use the minimum required. So you have to add more just to cover the reels.

There is enough syrup (6 ml) in 288 ml of dilution E to properly develop your film. The rest is only needed because 288 ml may not be enough to cover the film.

If you turn a 600 ml tank on its side and use a rotary processor, 288 ml will do the job fine (although I would recommend 300 ml, for simplicity).

adelorenzo · Mar 17, 2014

MattKing said:
Kodak's capacity recommendations extrapolate out to 6 mls of syrup per roll of 120/135-36/8x10 sheet.

I use a minimum 3ml per roll or sheet film equivalent without any issue, that is rotary or inversion. I also use 1:49 dilution.

NedL · Mar 17, 2014

In the flickr group discussions that Auroraua mentioned, they played around with some very dilute solutions for stand and semi-stand. One was dilution "M" ( for "Mike", the fellow who tried it.. ) 1:250.

One time I was playing with an old Kodak duaflex loaded with tri-x, the ends of the spool sanded a little to fit... The duaflex has two shutter modes: snapshot and one like "bulb" where the shutter stays open as long as you hold the button down. When I finished the roll I realized that I'd had it on "bulb" mode so all the shots were probably overexposed. I tried dilution M full stand and the negatives actually came out very nice and were all easily printable. Not home right now so I can't check the notes, but I think it was a few gentle inversions followed by 90 minutes w/o touching it. I used 2ml of syrup in a 480ml tank, so 1:240.

RattyMouse · Mar 17, 2014

MattKing said:
Only if you need 600 ml to cover the film in your tank.

The amount of syrup necessary to develop a roll of film is independent of which dilution you use - it is 6 ml whether you use A, B, C, D, E, F, G or H.

The problem you will encounter though is that the volume of working solution you end up with is quite small with many of those dilutions - the film isn't completely covered in the tank when you use the minimum required. So you have to add more just to cover the reels.

There is enough syrup (6 ml) in 288 ml of dilution E to properly develop your film. The rest is only needed because 288 ml may not be enough to cover the film.

If you turn a 600 ml tank on its side and use a rotary processor, 288 ml will do the job fine (although I would recommend 300 ml, for simplicity).

Bare with me here as I'm not following.

To start, I use a 500ml tank so that is how much solution I make up.

Dilution B (1:31), tells me to use 15.6 mls syrup into 484 mls of water.
Dilution E (1:48), tells me to use 10.4 mls syrup into 489 mls of water.

Clearly these two dilutions are not the same. E is more dilute than B. Both use more than 6mls syrup so are over kill in your eyes.

Where am I going wrong?

MattKing · Mar 17, 2014

RattyMouse said:
Bare with me here as I'm not following.

To start, I use a 500ml tank so that is how much solution I make up.

Dilution B (1:31), tells me to use 15.6 mls syrup into 484 mls of water.
Dilution E (1:48), tells me to use 10.4 mls syrup into 489 mls of water.

Clearly these two dilutions are not the same. E is more dilute than B. Both use more than 6mls syrup so are over kill in your eyes.

Where am I going wrong?

You aren't doing anything wrong. Your 500 ml tank forces you to use more developer than the film needs. If you could fit your reel into a 300 ml tank, then 300 ml of dilution E would do just as good a job developing the film as the 500 ml does in the tank you have.

You can save on the syrup by either:

a) using a tank that requires less working solution to cover the film;
b) using a tank on a rotary processor - with the tank on its side turning the film through the developer you don't need as much working solution; or
c) using a more dilute dilution of HC-110 (H- 1+63?).

Also note that the 6ml per roll that comes from Kodak's figures includes a generous safety margin. As has been posted above, many are prepared to use less. Even when I'm not working with replenished developer, I almost always use the 6 ml figure to be safe - who knows when I might have a whole bunch of dense, high key negatives that would be most likely to exhaust more dilute developer.

RattyMouse · Mar 17, 2014

So it is your suggestion that I could just add 6 mls into 594 mls of water and be good to go? That leaves developing time as a variable. I assume that since this is much more dilute than dilution E, I need to add more time.

I'm interested in this more as a curiosity than as possible method going forward. Dilution E works pretty well for me and is still very economical.

Thanks for helping me understand!

MattKing · Mar 17, 2014

RattyMouse said:
So it is your suggestion that I could just add 6 mls into 594 mls of water and be good to go? That leaves developing time as a variable. I assume that since this is much more dilute than dilution E, I need to add more time.

I'm interested in this more as a curiosity than as possible method going forward. Dilution E works pretty well for me and is still very economical.

Thanks for helping me understand!

No, I wouldn't suggest that.

Although it might be an interesting experiment.

The reason I brought this up in the first place is to try to make it clear that it is dangerous to think that the directions that come with the tanks will allways answer the question: "how much developer should I use?

The issue of whether or not there is the right amount of working solution developer for the tank is determined by the configuration of your developing tank and the procedure you use.

Whereas the issue of whether or not there is the right amount of developer for the film is also determined by the activity of the developer and the dilution you are using.

I have single roll 35mm developing tanks that only have room for 250 ml - I cannot quite get enough HC-110 dilution E into those tanks to ensure there is 6 ml of syrup to develop a roll of 135-36 (although it is close).

On the other hand, I have developing tanks that require over 650 ml to cover a 120 roll. If I use the developer one shot, I would be using twice as much syrup as the film requires.

You run into this even more if you use something like D-76 1+1. With that developer and dilution, people frequently run the risk of exhausting the developer in the tank, because each roll requires a lot of stock D-76

RattyMouse · Mar 17, 2014

MattKing said:
I have single roll 35mm developing tanks that only have room for 250 ml - I cannot quite get enough HC-110 dilution E into those tanks to ensure there is 6 ml of syrup to develop a roll of 135-36 (although it is close).

Matt,

I think one of the reasons why I'm a bit confused by your ideas is that you have a different idea of what dilution E (or any other HC-110) is compared to me.

Above you indicate that dilution E is not enough volume for your 135 tank. Dilution E to me is 1:47, a ratio not a volume. You can make 10 mls of this dilution or you can make 55 gallons. All that matters is that 1 part syrup is used for 47 parts water.

Kodak gives measurements in their publication for many different volumes of dilution E (as well as the others).

So why not make up the needed volume?

Dilution E is 1:47 and seems to have more syrup than you and others think is necessary. I guess I should just leave it at that because even if I go lower, I dont have the proper development times. I dont see much information aside from dilution B and E.

Sorry to not follow along as well as you'd probably like.

Thomas Bertilsson · Mar 17, 2014

1+50. Easy to mix. Works well. I have used it for two rolls of 135 in a two reel tank, and even though I was only able to fit 560ml developer into the tank, it presented no consistency problems development wise (the whole 6ml / film thing is overrated).

Cold · Mar 17, 2014

I think one of the reasons why I'm a bit confused by your ideas is that you have a different idea of what dilution E (or any other HC-110) is compared to me.

If that's the case, I think that it's because you have a slightly skewed perception of what's going on.

I think you're missing the part about Kodak's recommendation that regardless of solution, there be 6mL of syrup per roll of film. If you had some sort of long, sleeve-like container that allowed you to use just 30 mL of liquid and cover the entire film surface with developing solution, then you'd have to use a 1:5 solution to be sure that you included the 6mL syrup requirement. 30mL of Dil-B simply wouldn't have enough active ingredient to develop the entire roll with the tiny amount of syrup that would be used in a batch that small.

Similarly, I tend to use Dil-H when I'm developing two rolls at a time because my 2 roll tank is large enough to allow me to use at least 12mL of syrup in the quantity of solution required to fill it (6 per roll), however I have a smaller single-roll tank that doesn't have room for the amount of solution produced by 6mL of Dil-H, so I have to go to a more concentrated solution (and shorter dev time) to ensure I meet the 6mL per roll, regardless of concentration, requirement.

NB23 · Mar 17, 2014

What a weird discussion this is.

To me, mixing 1:1359 or 1:50 is just as easy.

Axle · Mar 17, 2014

I was always a fan of Dilution B and still am, and can produce some fantastic results with it. But I've recently started playing with Dilution A and pushing Tri-X one stop, or pulling it a stop and using Dilution E.

RattyMouse · Mar 17, 2014

Thanks Cold.....your post helped me understand Matt's a bit better now.

Thomas Bertilsson · Mar 17, 2014

NB23 said:
To me, mixing 1:1359 or 1:50 is just as easy.

Congratulations!

miha · Mar 17, 2014

RattyMouse said:
Above you indicate that dilution E is not enough volume for your 135 tank. Dilution E to me is 1:47, a ratio not a volume. You can make 10 mls of this dilution or you can make 55 gallons. All that matters is that 1 part syrup is used for 47 parts water.

250/47 < 6 ml of syrup.

HC-110; Your Favorite Dilution?

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