Is my Xtol dead?

[Ambar]

Hi,
I have some Xtol I mixed to it's stock dilution and kept in a bottle. But I'm afraid it might have gone dead.. Is there any way to test it before I put it through a batch and potentially ruin a perfectly well exposed tri-x?
Here are the details:
I mixed it up on Jan/30 and kept it in a sealed 600ml coke bottle untill more or less a month and a half ago. At which point I used half the bottle and kept it sealed in the fridge (dunno if the fridge actually helps at all). Before I used the first time, it was sealed air tight with NO air inside. But once I used it a month or so ago, its been air tight sealed but half full, ever since.

Am I gonna be OK or will it certainly reck everything? Is there anyway to test the activity of a developer before using it (like when you test the fixer with a piece of the leader)?
Any help would be awesome! I've read around that Xtol has a tendency to just drop dead with no discoloration and no warning.
Thanks a lot already!!

 

[tkamiya]

You can take a clipping of film (like the leader you clip off anyway before rolling). Soak it in XTOL for whatever the time specified for the film. Then fix the film. You can do this in daylight. If the film does NOT reach its full density, then the developer has gone bad.

 

[Terry Christian]

There's really no way to tell whether it's good or not without doing a clip test as tkamiya described, but I think it'll be just fine. I use Xtol in a replenishing scheme, and a partially full replenishing bottle I use, unused over the winter, was good when I started using it again. From what I've read, it seems most of the sudden death incidences involved Xtol packets less than 5L that Kodak made early on.

 

[tkamiya]

By the way....

The sudden death syndrome aside (I have not personally experienced it), I have seen XTOL get weaker, not just drop dead completely. When I was using XTOL just a year or two ago, I had a left over bottle about 8 months old kept in fairly air tight condition. I tested it for heck of it using the described procedure. It didn't die completely but produced a weak black. So please don't assume, it's on and off type situation.

 

[brucemuir]

A clip test won't tell you if it's lost activity a bit would it?
Seems like it would only indicate if it died completely unless there is some standard you know…say like, will give max black spot in 5 mins etc? ? ?

 

[tkamiya]

No, slight loss of activity would be impossible to tell from a simple clip test. As you say, we need a standard for that. In my test, I knew how dark the fully exposed leader should get. My clip test showed it turned gray not as dark as it should be. So my conclusion was, it was significantly weak.

To OP:
Honestly, if you are doubting your developer and it's an important roll, I'd mix fresh. You'll need a fresh developer soon anyway for your next 6 months. What I do is, instead of keeping the entire stock solution in one big jug, I keep mine in a bunch of smaller ones. I use one 1/2 gallon, two 1/4 gallon, and many small ones. I start using from the smallest and once all small ones are empty, divvy up the next size into the small ones, and so on. That way, every jug is kept full and exposure to air is limited. Doing this, it will last full 6 months and some.

 

[Newt_on_Swings]

When in doubt, pour it out. 5L of Xtol is $10-11. A roll of film is now ~$4-4.50. Not a big deal, you already got half the use of it since you have half left. Chems are replaceable, images maybe not.

If you don't care, just take a chance, but load only 1 reel, not 2. Or take a few feet of film only and sacrifice one image.

I have left xtol in seltzer bottles which I squeeze out as much air as possible. No failures.

 

[dehk]

clip test. a;; my xtol never went dead - dead. But i mixed them with distilled water.

 

[pentaxuser]

In the future it might be worth keeping the film leader developed from a fresh batch of Xtol and comparing that with the leader only developed in "suspect" Xtol. That should give a good indication before committing the actual film to the suspect developer.

However if you have to develop the film in the suspect Xtol now then if the leader goes black to look at in ordinary daylight or strong artificial light and only shows a 100W lamp's filament dimly when held within 2-3 feet of the bulb then I'd say that the developer is still good.

You might want to store future Xtol in bottles whose capacity is exactly what the film needs or use winebags or use Protectan or similar gas to expel the air when the bottle is partially empty.

pentaxuser