Still having problems with developing

Another frustrating day trying to process negatives. I went ahead and loaded a batch of 6 sheets of 4x5 black and white into my 20th Century Camera reel. I have had good results with this reel up to this point, and I was hesitant to identify it as a cause for the problems I have been having with development, but looking at my results today makes me think that is the culprit.

The thing is, I was using Arista 200 black and white film. I've always had good luck with this negative film, but in the last two weeks, I've had problems. I thought it might be a number of causes, maybe it was the chemicals that were not fresh (developer and/or fix), or an inadvertent light leak, or my filters were dirty, something along those lines. Today, however, I developed a few negatives from my trip last week to the California Botanic Gardens. There should have been no problem, I was using my fresh Arista 4x5 film. I also did not notice any dirt or smudges on my filters. I mixed up fresh batches of developer and fix. And the kicker is, I developed an 8x10 sheet of film of the same precise type, Arista 200 black and white. It was not in the reel, of course, it was in another developing tank, my Stearman Press 8x10 tray. Here is what I got with my 8x10 sheet of film, using the SAME chemicals (fresh batches each time) of developer and fix.

Regardless of how I can critique my composition, I think the negative looks fine. It is maybe a little overdeveloped, but no haze, no bands of discoloration, it looks fine. And this is what I obtained with my 20th Century Camera reel:

Same development times for both, fresh chemicals for both, but a different reel. The results are disastrous. Look at the haze, look at the horizontal band in the middle (which corresponds to the holding arm of the reel, I think), and the band to the right, which I don't know what it could correspond to, but I think is the outer edge, or a location where one sheet of film touches another? The horizontal band is the conclusive evidence for me, though. It tells me that the reel is leaving artifacts on the negatives, and that, furthermore, something else is happening such that, when I develop, I get this milky haze. I have always agitated my film with inversions, and most of the time, I would say always, I would get great results. But now, I get useless negatives.

Something is fishy in the state of Denmark. Something is not right, and I think I have eliminated the chemicals and eliminated my agitation regime, and also, I checked my filter (I almost always use a UV and a Red 25A filter), and they were very clean. 

My last resort is to go ahead and thoroughly clean the reels once again. Maybe that was the problem, since I was rinsing only in water after each development cycle. I used soap and a towelette this time, and scrubbed everything. I hope to be able to see a difference with new negatives because, frankly, it ruined many of my sheets today. I loaded six 4x5 sheets, and only two had visible images, the ones I uploaded above. They are not usable, but they are visible. I lost four sheets because nothing was on them. Nothing. How is this possible? And I lost four sheets last time too, when I developed a few days ago. I obtain sheets with nothing on them. This indicates a massive problem, and I can't find any other solution.

At least the B's reel never gave me the haze I am getting now. It did leave, however, a residue of anti-halation in a vertical band, but that was after hundreds of negatives exposed. In this case, I have not had the 20th Century Camera reel for that long, only a few months, and I have only exposed a few dozen sheets of film. Maybe 30. To be fair, though, I did have this problem with a few rolls of 120 JCH Streetpan 400, from my trip to Brand Park in Glendale, and those are other reels entirely. What has changed is the developer, I was using Clayton F76 before, and switched to Arista developer recently. Could that be the cause? 

I am going to try to swing by Freestyle tomorrow (Monday) and see if I can pick up a fresh bottle of Clayton F76. I will also take my Travelwide 4x5 and take some photos of Heritage Park. I'll try to get some photos and return home to see the results. Hopefully I can get something. 

This is what it feels like to try to identify problems by elimination. We'll see, but all I can say is, the Arista developer worked fine with my sheet of 8x10 film today.