sschering
Member
This is a re hash of what I posted on a reply to my Show off your pens posting but I thought it could use it's one line of discussion.
When I got down to my last few ounces of Cactus juice I thought it would try adding some dye and see how it goes with some spalted hackberry.
That piece turned out nice with good penetration but it was more pink than the red I was going for.
I had the barrels turned down, sanded and ready to start finishing and I see the bottle of Alumilite dye sitting there next to the CA. OK why not.. I put on some nitrile gloves, folded up a paper towel the same as I would for a CA finish and put a small drop of dye on the end and put it to the wood with the lathe turning slow (same speed I used for CA application.
The wood soaked it up fairly quickly and I only got maybe a 1/4 done with the first application.. I had to re load 3 or 4 times get a good even coat across the whole barrel. Then I took a clean paper towel and buffed off the excess dye. After changing gloves I sealed it in under 8-10 coat of thin CA following the usual finishing methods.
That worked out so well I tried it again with some stabilized burl that was done with clear cactus juice.
I used the same methods as before but this time I tried using WTF.
This didn't work out as I had hoped. Even after 6 coats and long drying times I was still getting dye transferring on to the cloth I was using to apply the WTF plus I was getting no finish build up. I don't think WTF and Alumilite dye play well together. I was able to apply CA over the WTF and still get a good finish.
You get a little more variation with the clear stabilized burl but overall it took the dye very well.
I plan to play around some more with some un stabilized woods and different dye colors.
When I got down to my last few ounces of Cactus juice I thought it would try adding some dye and see how it goes with some spalted hackberry.
That piece turned out nice with good penetration but it was more pink than the red I was going for.
I had the barrels turned down, sanded and ready to start finishing and I see the bottle of Alumilite dye sitting there next to the CA. OK why not.. I put on some nitrile gloves, folded up a paper towel the same as I would for a CA finish and put a small drop of dye on the end and put it to the wood with the lathe turning slow (same speed I used for CA application.
The wood soaked it up fairly quickly and I only got maybe a 1/4 done with the first application.. I had to re load 3 or 4 times get a good even coat across the whole barrel. Then I took a clean paper towel and buffed off the excess dye. After changing gloves I sealed it in under 8-10 coat of thin CA following the usual finishing methods.
That worked out so well I tried it again with some stabilized burl that was done with clear cactus juice.
I used the same methods as before but this time I tried using WTF.
This didn't work out as I had hoped. Even after 6 coats and long drying times I was still getting dye transferring on to the cloth I was using to apply the WTF plus I was getting no finish build up. I don't think WTF and Alumilite dye play well together. I was able to apply CA over the WTF and still get a good finish.
You get a little more variation with the clear stabilized burl but overall it took the dye very well.
I plan to play around some more with some un stabilized woods and different dye colors.
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