a mystery stain

[OmegaB600]

On thursday I made a bath of chemicals, all chemicals bought this current year.

16 ounce of ilford multigrade developer
500ml of ilford rapid fixer
1 liter fomacitro stop bath

On sunday the fomacitro stop bath had lost its "orange drink" smell, and had started growing small blobs of mold. I dumped it and cleaned the measuring cup. made a 1 liter of tap water with 2 tablespoons citric acid.

On Tuesday the citric acid stop bath was going strong so i made 2 prints. Everything came out fine. I dumped the citric acid stop bath.

On wednesday I made a NEW stop bath, 16 ounces water, 1 large tablespoon of citric acid. Make 2 more prints. the first print of the day is fine and just as good as the previous two.

The second print of the day, and the 4th for this batch of developer and fixer, has a wierd rusty stain on the margin. It wiped off with a damp paper towel. I dumped the stop bath thinking maybe the developer carryover.

thursday I make two more prints.
the first print came out ok but with the rusty slime stain on the edges. Most of it wiped off.

To do the second print i switched to an unopened pack of kentmer RC VC lustre. I read the insert and noticed the 3 minutes for fixing. So i did the print with 3 minutes of fixing. And for some reason the entire image and margin/border are stained. It is not a coating that can be scratched or wiped off. Its been absorbed INTO the emulsion and image like a toner would be.

I admit the developer did smell like rotting urine today, and i have dumped all my mixed chemicals and need to clean the containers and mix new when i have time

Anyone have any idea what I did wrong?

 

[Muggins]

Stop Bath shouldn't go off for many uses - is usually coloured with a pH indicator and a long as its colour it started it will be fine. Developers are alkaline (look up the pH of a solution of the ingredients in caffenol) and the acid stop bath neutralises any remaining developer, making your fix last longer. So if you are making homebrew stop bath, add an indicator dye to it.

If you are getting developer carry-over then something is wrong as your stop should last much longer than you've described.

Random thoughts:
Were you following the dilutions for paper, not confusing them with those for film (I know Ilford fixers have different dilutions)?

Is that "large tablespoonful" of citric acid enough/too much?

Could it be crud in your developing dish?

What's the shelf life of mixed developer? It looks as though you are using it for a week, with no mention of storage conditions. Stop and fixer both last, so I'd investigate c the developer first - especially if the smell changes.

 

[OmegaB600]

the fomacitro stop bath had small mold clusters growing in it after a few days.

The first citric acid stop bath i made had NO growth after the same number of days, used it once and discarded.

the ilford multigrade developer was getting darker each time i used it. And the smell was going off with each use.

ill be cleaning my containers again, and the cibachrome tubes again as well.

I found a thread on FADU, that would have the issue be caused by either TOO MUCH TIME IN FIXER or screwy paper developr. Or a combination of both.