How far can I dilute Dektol?

[George Collier]

Or use something for a trough of some kind, like wallpaper glue thingies, you can get at local building supply. A lot less chem, just see saw the print back and forth. You might be able to use your normal dilution with just a bit more time. Test a strip and compare to a small tray developed print that has the blacks and contrast you want.

[PhotoJim]

Other options to diluting:

1. Buy the one-litre pack.
2. Buy the ingredients to make D-72 (very similar to Dektol) from scratch, and then you can mix up precisely what you want and no more.
3. Mix a bull fatch and use it up. Print another shot too, or make contact sheets or other prints.

The stock solution will keep for a few months. You can mix up the 3.8-litre pack, and only use part of it. Dilute the portion you need to do your prints, and save the rest for another batch of developing in a week or two or ten.

[tkamiya]

3. Mix a bull fatch and use it up.

He, he, he..... spell checker strikes again!

[tkamiya]

Yes, Jim, I can mix my own D-72.... I have been doing that, actually. Sadly, at the quantity I purchase, it costs me more than double of buying a gallon bag of Dektol.

But that really isn't the problem. I just wanted to make ONE print with minimum of stock solution. I'm going to try this tomorrow. I got side tracked today.

[Michael R 1974]

tkamiya. The drum option might be your best bet.

Richard Henry did fairly extensive densitometric testing of Dektol at various dilutions, development times with factorial development etc. At dilutions greater than 1+2 dmax began to fall off even with increased development time and there was increasing compression of all densities > approx 1.5. Further, development times greater than 8 minutes tended to cause fogging problems. Granted, these tests were with Ilfobrom in the 80s, but still probably directionally useful.

[Athiril]

It depends on the paper you're using, many have a developer built in, which simply on it's own can develop to a deep grey, which just needs a little extra developer to get to full dMax.

[tkamiya]

It's an Adorama store brand RC paper. I have no idea who actually manufacturers these paper....

I'm going to try drum for the first time.

[NedL]

I use Adorama store brand a lot and my normal dilution for dektol is 1:4. I used to use 1:2, 2 minutes and could never see much difference between 1:30 and 2:00. Now with 1:4 I usually go about 2:15, but I can't see much difference after 2:00. I use a method similar to single tray, except it's "single container".

[PhotoJim]

Nice typo I did there

[NedL]

My bull fatch didn't last.