In excised, curarized and massively stimulated fast-twitch mouse gastrocnemius muscles the early twitch tension enhancements (treppe) during 1/s activity between 10 and 36 degrees C increase and affect more contractions as temperature increases. Tension output eventually declines at a temperature-independent rate. Half-relaxation time lengthens below 25 degrees C and shortens above 25 degrees C. During 1/0.63s twitches half-relaxation time lengthens even at 25 degrees C. In slow-twitch soleus muscles activity decreases twitch tension and half-relaxation time regardless of temperature. Activity shortens contraction times in both muscles. Oxygen lack induced by NaN3 cannot account satisfactorily for these results. Activation is apparently more plastic in the gastrocnemius than in the soleus, and the relationship between the rates of their activation and relaxation processes and the temperature sensitivities of these rates also seem to differ. In both muscles caffeine can convert activity-induced shortened of half-relaxation times into prolongations. In the soleus this effect is more pronounced at 30 than at 25 degrees C. At high temperature and twitch rates caffeine reduces treppe amplitude and duration without affecting the eventual twitch tension decline in the gastrocnemius while it greatly accelerates twitch tension decline in the soleus. In both muscles intrafiber Ca2+ movements are apparently major determinants of fatigue behavior.