Two developer darkroom - What should I pair with Rodinal?

[GregY]

Lot's of great developers out there. I suggest you consider Pyrocat HD, Pyro 510 or Perceptol.

Yes! Another voice in the wilderness

 

[oxcanary]

My vote goes for HC110and FX39. A bottle Rodinal as well to keep forever is also a given here.

 

[retina_restoration]

OLD Rodinal will keep for years, yes. But the modern versions of it will not. Expect it to be useless within 6 months of opening the bottle. I speak from experience.

 

[SodaAnt]

OLD Rodinal will keep for years, yes. But the modern versions of it will not. Expect it to be useless within 6 months of opening the bottle. I speak from experience.

Buy a bunch of small bottles, say 50ml and/or 100ml and decant the big bottle into the smaller bottles.

 

[pentaxuser]

OLD Rodinal will keep for years, yes. But the modern versions of it will not. Expect it to be useless within 6 months of opening the bottle. I speak from experience.

Is this also true of the Adox Rodinal which Adox says is identical to the former Rodinal? Which of the modern versions are useless in 6 months?

Thanks

pentaxuser

 

[John Wiegerink]

Is this also true of the Adox Rodinal which Adox says is identical to the former Rodinal? Which of the modern versions are useless in 6 months?

Thanks

pentaxuser

pentaxuser,
I've used the Adox Rodinal well past 6 months. In fact my bottle is going on three years and is in the original plastic/whatever bottle. Oh, and it is less than half full. Still works just fine for me.

 

[albireo]

OLD Rodinal will keep for years, yes. But the modern versions of it will not. Expect it to be useless within 6 months of opening the bottle.

Hard disagree. Adox Rodinal lasts for years. Fomadon R09 lasts a little less, but still more than 6 months in my household, without any gassing/marbles etc.

 

[pentaxuser]

Thanks both but I was curious about retina_ restoration's statement so I hope he will respond

pentaxuser

 

[Alex Benjamin]

Thanks both but I was curious about retina_ restoration's statement so I hope he will respond

pentaxuser

I'm also curious. One experience does not scientific proof make, as Yoda would say.

 

[JerseyDoug]

OLD Rodinal will keep for years, yes. But the modern versions of it will not. Expect it to be useless within 6 months of opening the bottle. I speak from experience.

Not all developers thought of as Rodinal equivalents are actually the same thing at all. The MSDS for ADOX Rodinal (or ADOX Adonal) lists only two "dangerous components": 4-aminophenol and potassium hydroxide. That isn't a complete list of the ingredients, of course - Rodinal is Tylenol + drain cleaner + washing soda - but if the MSDS for another developer does not list the same two "dangerous components" or if it lists any others it is not a Rodinal equivalent. And there is no reason to think it will last as long as the real thing.

My personal experience with ADOX Rodinal/Adonal is that I fill a 125ml bottle from the original 500ml bottle and put the big bottle away in a safe place. It takes me about 6 months to finish the 125ml so the Rodinal is in the partly filled original bottle for about a year and a half. The Rodinal gets darker and darker but it continues to produce exactly the same results. And to make matters worse for the naysayers I buy a new 500ml bottle of Rodinal every time I open a 500ml bottle the first time. So the Rodinal I actually use was in a sealed bottle for about two years and then in a partly filled bottle for as much as another year and a half before I use it.

 

[pentaxuser]

Not all developers thought of as Rodinal equivalents are actually the same thing at all.

My personal experience with ADOX Rodinal/Adonal is that I fill a 125ml bottle from the original 500ml bottle and put the big bottle away in a safe place. It takes me about 6 months to finish the 125ml so the Rodinal is in the partly filled original bottle for about a year and a half. The Rodinal gets darker and darker but it continues to produce exactly the same results. And to make matters worse for the naysayers I buy a new 500ml bottle of Rodinal every time I open a 500ml bottle the first time. So the Rodinal I actually use was in a sealed bottle for about two years and then in a partly filled bottle for as much as another year and a half before I use it.

I agree Doug. The first line is key. It maybe that retina_restoration is indeed basing his experience on Rodinal equivalents which are not in fact the same I cannot recall which one but one of them, maybe RO9 does not seem to have the same keeping properties but until he replies we won't know to which version of Rodinal he was referring

I am sure that a lot of people think that all versions are the original Rodinal but just called something different for a variety of reasons

pentaxuser

 

[Pieter12]

Why would you ever need anything else than Rodinal?

 

[Alex Benjamin]

Why would you ever need anything else than Rodinal?

 

[cliveh]

Sliced bread is the best thing since D76

 

[JerseyDoug]

Sliced bread is the best thing since D76

An apt metaphor. In my experience D-76 is dependable, like supermarket sliced bread, but not very interesting. It does what it does consistently and stays out of the way. Rodinal is more like an artisan whole grain bread. It's easy to get it wrong, but with the right ingredients (film in this case) and process it can be wonderful.

 

[koraks]

Rodinal is more like an artisan whole grain bread.

Coarse and lumpy, with a dark tint and a brittle crust?

 

[JerseyDoug]

Coarse and lumpy, with a dark tint and a brittle crust?

Exactly!

 

[wahiba]

In short I am currently using Rodinal and HC-110 in my darkroom, but I am running out of HC-110. I love Rodinal with certain films like Acros, but I reserve HC-110 for faster films like HP5. The HC-110 works well enough and I like it keeping properties, but feels a bit middle of the road when it comes to graininess and sharpness in 120 and 4x5 formats. Too gritty for for its lack of apparent sharpness, nor fine grained enough to justify it.

I only really want to keep two developers around in my darkroom and have them be different enough to have specific purposes. Xtol is a popular choice, but I don't want to keep 5 liters of it around nor would I be able to use it all before it goes bad. Pyrocat HD in glycol is something I'm possibly looking at, but I want to look at other options as well.

What sounds like a good pairing for Rodinal in the darkroom? Looking to try something new.

I have jar of coffee, a bag of soda, a bag of vitamin C and a tin of sea salt with bromide, and a small digital scale to weigh the stuff out on. Caffenol is my number 2!

 

[Steven Lee]

OLD Rodinal will keep for years, yes. But the modern versions of it will not. Expect it to be useless within 6 months of opening the bottle. I speak from experience.

Never used OLD Rodinal or Rodinal clones, but my ADOX Rodinal bottle is half-empty and pushing 2 years. I do not do anything special to prolong its life, it sits in the original 500ml bottle at room temperature.

 

[abruzzi]

Rollei R09 went bad on me in about 2 years. I currently have a half empty bottle the Adox stuff tha is a year old and it’s still fine.

 

[chuckroast]

Rollei R09 went bad on me in about 2 years. I currently have a half empty bottle the Adox stuff tha is a year old and it’s still fine.

This is why I make my Pyrocat-HD in glycol. It lasts for a loooooooong time in brown glass bottles.

 

[John Wiegerink]

This is why I make my Pyrocat-HD in glycol. It lasts for a loooooooong time in brown glass bottles.

Me too! love the stuff.

 

[chuckroast]

Me too! love the stuff.

I also use D-23 a fair bit, and hyper dilute it 1:9 adding 0.5g/litre of lye to it to maintain alkalinity, processing as semistand for 60mins. It gives razor sharp negatives and holds down highlight blowouts really nicely. However, it is NOT for smaller formats. The high dilution really reduces the solvent effect and you get very pronounced grain.

The tree picture below was done on 9x12 Fomapan 100 processed that way. The other one is 35mm Double-X done the same way. Note the differences in grain:

 

[Rolleiflexible]

Never used OLD Rodinal or Rodinal clones, but my ADOX Rodinal bottle is half-empty and pushing 2 years. I do not do anything special to prolong its life, it sits in the original 500ml bottle at room temperature.

I remember the day Agfa declared bankruptcy. I caught a 2 train down to B+H to buy up whatever I could get of Rodinal and MCC fiber paper. I was five minutes too late: A woman was just ahead of me, with the guy behind the counter loading crates of Rodinal into the conveyor for her. She said her boss (didn't say who) had sent her down to buy the last of the Rodinal. Seeing my crestfallen look, she let me take a case. It took me awhile to burn through it. It never went bad.

FWIW since then I've used Adox's version of Rodinal, which I had understood was the same as the Agfa formulation. I've never had a bottle go bad.

 

[Steven Lee]

@Rolleiflexible haha that's a great story!