Selenium Toning

Bob Carnie said:

So today I am printing murals and I used Hypam and mixed 1:4 which meant two full five liter bottles, one bottle for fix 1 and one for fix 2.
I spend about 3 - 4 minutes constant agitation combined two trays as normal times. These are really big sheets of paper and I feel that I really have to concentrate
to get good flow on each print.

You are using 1:9 which would save me a lot of chem. what would be your time for each tray at this higher dilution?

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Bob,

I use 1.5-2 minutes per bath in a two-fixing-bath regime with Hypam or Rapid Fixer 1+9 (basically what you are already using). Ilford recommends only 1 minute total time with the 1+4 dilution to achieve shorter wash times. With the longer times you have to keep in mind that this lets the fixer soak through the paper so adequate treatment with wash-aid and a longer wash will be required than for the Ilford "archival sequence." (I don't see how you could possibly keep the fixing time to 30 seconds per bath with such large prints anyway, though. I sure couldn't and it looks like you aren't anyway.) I use my own wash-aid (sodium sulfite and bisulfite) and treat prints for 10 minutes with agitation. Wash is minimum 60 minutes with a complete drain and refill of the washer halfway through. Never a problem with retained hypo or silver. Still, if you are going to change your work-flow, run a test print through at the end and do the ST-1 and HT-2 tests. FWIW, my capacity for this regime is 36 8x10s per liter of bath 1.

Best,

Doremus

Yes you are right Doremus no way I could do this in 60 seconds with the large paper, I find that it takes awhile to get good coverage and I am about 3 minutes total and for these prints 1 1/2 hour of wash.