To get that density, you need a combination of both exposure and development.
Do you have the charracteristic curve of the film you are using? In general
D76 is a "weaker" developer than XTol, but D76 should be able to give you that
density unless the exposure is real low but you want to increase contrast by
development.
A normal range for a negative processed for conderser head is about 0.9 (or
slightly less?), if you want to boost that to 1.7, imagine the change in curve
shape and you can see that that might be difficult.
>> An (slightly) related question: Can one "translate" the numbers/steps of a
Stouffer Step Wedge to the Zones of The Zone System i.e: Step number 5
eqquels Zone V ? I tend to think so: I took densitometer reading of all
steps, and step 5 reads (corr. for B/F) 0.66. One of my books gives a
corr. D for a greycard/Zone V as 0.70, so that seems to fit.
>>
The step tablet is a *relative* scale, so it depends on how you expose it and
how it measure the light (if you can do so). Whichever step you use to meter
the light can be considered as gray card (is it the zone V? I forgot now).
Suppose it is, than any step that you use to meter can be called Zone V, then
every 2 steps equal one zone (roughly, of course, as Stouffer step tables are
not truly equally spaced as one might like).
I am assuming you are using 21-step tablets. If you are using 31 steps, then 3
steps equal one zone.