Ian, what PQ developer is best in your opinion? I thought ID-68 was nearly the best possible using PQ, so I'm surprised you disliked its grain. Actually, I'm wondering how the best PQ compares to the best PC, primarily in terms of grain, but also for sharpness.
Mark Overton
Some people use Autophen and rate it highly, ironically they think they are mixing Microphen because the Photolab Index assumed the Axford-Kendall PQ Fine Grain Developer "Autophen" formula was that for Microphen, this error continued in various US books and I think into the Darkroom Cookbook 2nd edition.
I would think Autophen is slightly better than ID-68/Microphen, Ilford research realised the PQ version of ID-11/D76 gave a slight speed increase over the MQ developer and took this a step further by cutting the Sulphite for ID-68/Microphen, they also dropped the Phenidone from 0.2g/l to 0.13 g/l so requiring an increase in development times.
In Kendall's 1940 Phenidone Patent there's an Example of a PQ version of ID-11/D76 just substituting the 2/l Metol with 0.2g/l Phenidone, but with no changes in buffering, By 1954 which is around the time of Phenidone's commercial introduction by Ilford. In the next few years there's some slight tweaking of the buffering until the final published Autophen formula and its introduction in 1957.
As you can see from the above image Autophen was not sold in "Amateur" sized packaging, and was available in Powder as well as Liquid form.
Back in the mid to late 1980's I did some extensive testing and actually found that Ilford PQ Universal gave very fine grain and excellent sharpness with FP4, but then it was one of the recommended developers for Ilford Ortho film which we'd used for work. I didn't use the usual recommended dilution of 1+19 instead tested it at 1+29 and 1+39. There was logic to this, May & Baker (now Champion) Suprol a similar PQ developer came with a very comprehensive photo-copied data booklet. They gave comprehensive details for it's use in Photo-finishing machines, and also for reversal processing of cine films, there was also a section on it's use dilute as a Fine grain developer at these dilutions.
While he results with PQ Universal were excellent in terms fine grain and sharpness, but compared to ID-11there was a slight speed drop maybe half a stop, but it was very "Clean" working. By clean working really we mean less base fog, although this is more to do with dissolved colloidal silver at higher Sulphite levels which is why the 70-85g/l is more optimal than 100g/l
Of course there are the more recently formulated PQ liquid developers HC-110, Ilfotec HC/LC29, DD-X, Ilfosol 3, I found HC-110 and Ilfotec dropped film speed the others were released later.
Back to your question, I'd expect Autophen to be slightly better than ID-11/D76 sat between them and ID-68/Microphen. In terms of overall balance of speed, fine grain, and sharpness they aren't as good as Xtol or Rodinal. The caveat with Rodinal is its better with some films than others while Xtol is excellent with all, in comparison to PC which I assume you mean Pyrocat HD in terms of fine grain, sharpness and tonal range there's no noticeable difference in practical terms.
If I wanted to increase sharpness I'd try Pyrocat-M. The ratio of Phenidone to Pyrocetchin in HD is 2:50 but Pyrocat-M isn't a straight Metol Pyrocatechin equivalent as the ratio is 2.5:50 an 1/8th the quantity (assuming Phenidone is 10x more active than Metol). Sandy King has said Pyrocat-M is sharper but then it's getting closer to Hans Windisch's Pyrocatechin Surface developer.
Ian