What is this stuff?

[Kapten Stofil]

When cleaning out our local photo club's darkroom, we came across a couple of plastic bags of what appeared to be developer. One is a large bag marked "B" with about 7 litres/several kgs of a white powder, the other is a much smaller bag marked "A" with about half a litre/a few hundred g of slightly brownish crystals. One of the bags had the logo of a large film processing company that does processing for the movie industry. They were obviously several years old. Both were in an outer bag marked "D-76".

Can this actually be D-76? All the D-76 I have seen has been in one bag or can, not two. If it is D-76, how would one make it up? Is it likely to still work?

 

[George Papantoniou]

I don't know what is in your bags... but Ilford makes D-76 (it's called ID-11) and they sell it in two separate bags... they're marked A and B (what a coincidence !!!)...

 

[Kapten Stofil]

I checked out ID-11 and it does indeed seem to be just that, the bag sizes are consistent with ID-11 (developing agents in bag A, about 1/10 by weight of bag B).

I'll give it a try and see what happens. I may have a lifetime supply of developer...

 

[Bob F.]

It is quite possible that Kodak provided bulk chemicals to the photo trade in two packs as that would be cheaper. Alternately, the smaller bag may be replenisher. Wait for someone who has experience of the trade to reply before mixing them together....

Have fun, Bob.

 

[ZorkiKat]

Traditional D76 and D72 powders came in two packs. The smaller pack would contain hydroquinone and metol (hence the brownish looking crystals), and the larger bag would contain sulphite, alkaline (borax or carbonate), and bromide, if any.

Reason why they came separate is that metol usually won't dissolve in the presence of sulphite. Thus it was necessary to dissolve the developing agents first before adding the rest of the developer components.

Makers of single-powder packs have done something to the mix which makes it possible to dissolve everything together in one powder-dumping action.

Jay