Lith home made developer recommendations?

[Photopathe]

Hi! I am planning to do my first attempt at lith printing soon. My papers are Fomatone 131/132 and Ilford Classic gloss/mat. I want to mix the developer myself and Ansco 81 seems like a tempting choice but i read it's not a real lith developer and not a good choice. I would prefer without formaldehyde if possible.
Any recommendation for the choice of home made developer together with dilution starting points ?
Many thanks!

 

[koraks]

Kodak D9
Ryuji Suzuki's 'Burning Lith' developer - or any creative spin on it: http://altphotolist.org/lists/alt-photo-process/2006/jun06/0253.htm
Here's a derivative of the latter replacing the phosphate with carbonate: https://www.photrio.com/forum/threads/lith-printing--homebrew-developers.26536/post-370901

When I lith printed regularly, I made stock solutions of a Ryuji Suzuki derivative. Sadly, I lost my notes of that one, but it essentially boiled down to just the hydroquinone, some bromide and sulfite, and then edging close to the solubility limit of the hydroquinone. That gave me a concentrated stock that lasted quite long even in a partially full bottle. After a couple of weeks or months it would oxidize beyond functionality, though. I always mixed up fairly small batches of the concentrate so I used it up before it went bad. I would add carbonate from a separate concentrated stock solution.

dilution starting points

Ah, you'll have to experiment. But there's a bandwidth that works. Just give it a try with a test strip. If it takes too long, increase dilution. If it goes too fast, do the opposite.
You can (and probably should) further modify speed and lith behavior by adding bromide and/or sulfite. Keep some solutions of either handy. Especially bromide is an important one as it strongly influence lith behavior as well as image tone.

 

[Photopathe]

Thanks @koraks ! Will try the "carbonated" version of Suzuki's Burning lith very soon. Will report back...

 

[koraks]

Cool! Have fun with it. I've got a feeling I might brush off the lith thing soon as well. I still have some Fomatone and I've recently made some negatives that would work particularly well with lith, I think.

 

[Rudeofus]

You definitely have to try @grainyvision's home brew lith formulas. Ashley is on photrio as member @grainyvision

 

[MattKing]

In what may be an excess of caution, I've edited out part of the real world name of grainyvision from the previous post. Generally speaking, if someone participating here doesn't use their actual name as a screen name or include their real name in their signature - grainyvision includes Ashley <3 in their's - we prefer it if you leave it up to the member to disclose their real name in a public post.
I am fully aware that I haven't looked at all of the nearly 700 posts from grainyvision, and the real name might have been disclosed by them there.