Used too much sulfite in developer

[JPD]

I went to the darkroom to mix up a liter of Agfa 44 film developer. Since I was also going to mix D-76 later I had "100g Sodium sulfite" in my mind.

Agfa 44:
Metol - 1,5g
Sodium sulfite - 80g (I used 100g by mistake!)
Hydroquinone - 3g
Borax - 3g
Potassium bromide - 0,5g

What would you have done? One option is to use the developer as normal, 1+1, but cut the time by maybe a minute. The other option is to go back and make another 250 ml with no sulfite tomorrow and mix it with the developer I've already made.

 

[David Lyga]

I always modify my D-76 because I find NO NEED for as much sulfite that they 'require'. Maybe, as a result, my grain is sharper. Your 'mistake' is only wasteful, not a cause to throw away the solution. Use as normal, maybe the extra sulfite will slightly increase the alkalinity, but simply make a minor adjustment. Next time, do the frugal David Lyga thing by using ONLY half the 'required' sulfite. - David Lyga

 

[dE fENDER]

I went to the darkroom to mix up a liter of Agfa 44 film developer. Since I was also going to mix D-76 later I had "100g Sodium sulfite" in my mind.

Agfa 44:
Metol - 1,5g
Sodium sulfite - 80g (I used 100g by mistake!)
Hydroquinone - 3g
Borax - 3g
Potassium bromide - 0,5g

What would you have done? One option is to use the developer as normal, 1+1, but cut the time by maybe a minute. The other option is to go back and make another 500 ml with no sulfite tomorrow and mix it with the developer I've already made.

Proportionally increase other ingridients if you need exactly the recipe.

Or you can just develop without any changes, it will work as original...

 

[JPD]

I always modify my D-76 because I find NO NEED for as much sulfite that they 'require'. Maybe, as a result, my grain is sharper. Your 'mistake' is only wasteful, not a cause to throw away the solution. Use as normal, maybe the extra sulfite will slightly increase the alkalinity, but simply make a minor adjustment. Next time, do the frugal David Lyga thing by using ONLY half the 'required' sulfite. - David Lyga

That's the reason why I chose to start using Agfa 44 in the first place, the sharper grain and using less chemicals compared to D-76. I'm leaning towards to option to correct the mistake by mixing up more of the developer and compensating for the sulfite. I'm not sure I want to risk the sheets to be overdeveloped because they were taken in strong sunlight.

 

[Anon Ymous]

That's the reason why I chose to start using Agfa 44 in the first place, the sharper grain and using less chemicals compared to D-76. I'm leaning towards to option to correct the mistake by mixing up more of the developer and compensating for the sulfite. I'm not sure I want to risk the sheets to be overdeveloped because they were taken in strong sunlight.

In which case you need to mix 250ml of developer without sulfite, not the 500ml you mention in the original post.

 

[JPD]

In which case you need to mix 250ml of developer without sulfite, not the 500ml you mention in the original post.

Thank you for the correction! Of course. Edited the post.

 

[MattKing]

Keep that batch for use when you want something slightly finer grained.

 

[JPD]

I made 250 ml more without the sulfite (ok, with only a pinch of sulfite) and mixed it with yesterday's batch. I thought that the proportions should be correct because I plan to use half of the developer to test the times for Fp4 and then consistency is important. I predict that 13-14 minutes in 1+1 dilution will be about right.