Chuck,(posted 8714 days ago)When using high-accutance developers, i.e. anything not advertised as "fine grain", you need to take advantage of the compensating effect to get full emulsion speed. Compensation occurs when the developer exhausts itself in the highlight (dense) portions of the negative, but keeps working in the shadow (less dense) portions. This effectively gives the shadows more development thus increasing effective speed.
Two things contribute to this: 1) a rather weak developer dilution, which delivers less developer concentration to the film thus allowing the highlights to use up all the available develper more quickly, and 2) minimum agitation, which keeps the exhausted developer in the highlighs from being replaced while the developer continues to work in the shadows. You can surmise from this that the effect is proportional to density: The less dense, the more actual development takes place, which allows fuller development of the shadows without excessive contrast. Since film speed is based on low-density areas of the negative, this increases emulsion speed while keeping contrast in check. All this means that developing in a drum with constatnt agitation and normal dilutions(thereby reducing the compensating effect) will reduce film speed and increase contrast accordingly. To get the greatest film speed and accutance without too much contrast, process in trays with long developing times and minimum agitation. I would recommend a return to tray processing. Hope this helps, ;^D)