Hello, gurus of large format!
I'm still a newbie at doing my own developing. The first times I did it, it went great. This time, the drying stage left a thick, sticky residue. I thought I had used too much wetting agent (and I was right... I used the manufacturer's recommended dilution, which was too much) but I washed only in clean (non-distilled) water on the next one and still got the sticky residue. I even tried my squeegee and it just seems to make the stickiness spread. On another negative, I also tried a pre-soak in water.
I know film is soft before being dry... but one I dried 45 minutes ago is still tacky.
Details:
Efke PL100M 4x5 (tray-developed)
Ilford LC29 5 minutes at 20 degrees Celcius, agitated first 10 seconds of every minute
Ilfostop 10 seconds (is this too short??? it worked last time!)
Ilford rapid fixer 8 mins.
Ilford wetting agent (1+201 as per manufacturer's specs) - most negs for a short soak, one neg for a long soak. No difference. Also tried no wetting agent.
Any advice much appreciated.
Dan
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