how to test e-6 first developer. is it good?

found in my garage an unopened bottles of fuji hunt E-6 first developer, purchased in nov 2019. funny as my current stash is finished. is there a way I can test to see if it is still good with say B&W film? its much cheaper the slide film and I have many more rolls of it. if not, that's fine, just gotta waste a slide film 35mm roll. i could roll a short roll of B&W test it and order more 1st dev or not. I have searched, but there is conflicting info on this.

thanks

john

I've no idea how to test on and white. I have used 1st developer that old without any problems. No room for error though.

E6 FD diluted 1+9 with tap water makes an excellent black&white film developer, especially for slower, fine grained films. However, you'd have to establish a base line to see, whether a specific batch of E6 FD is still fine. If you don't have a base line, or a small sample of known good E6 FD to compare against, then your best bet is checking the color of your E6 FD concentrate. Anything darker than pale brown will show lower activity, which can sometimes be compensated by using longer E6 FD times. YMMV.

The best investment so far were these two boxes of Fuji process control strips for C-41 and E-6. They are pricey, I grant you that, but so is a roll of film going to waste because of some mixing error, not even talking about the loss of subject matter.

thanks. guess its time to break out one of my bulk rolls of provia, roll a short roll and test it with that. hate to use a whole roll, but i guess its a small price to pay.

john

destroya said:

thanks. guess its time to break out one of my bulk rolls of provia, roll a short roll and test it with that. hate to use a whole roll, but i guess its a small price to pay.

john

Click to expand...

Let us know how you come out.

I need to make some test strips. Activity of the 1st developer, time, and Jobo hyper-agitation all create a room for unexpected results. When I shoot 35mm slides I auto bracket every shot, it's proved to be a good strategy.
I have quite a collection of darkroom junk, I've got a couple deep tank hangers for 8x10 that have a neat insert for a test strip.