Interesting Aniline Dye Reaction

[HuntinDoug]

I have a current student that is building a UK themed guitar. She wanted white dots with blue paw prints, and a white block on the 12th fret with "wildcats" in dark blue. We decided to use white acrylic etched in the laser. Normally I use epoxy for flood filled areas, but this time I opted to use dyed thin CA glue for the blue areas.

I mixed in LMI brand blue alcohol soluble powdered aniline dye, filled the areas, removed the bubbles, and waited. I'm not a big fan of spray accelerator. When the CA glue flashed over, I noticed it smoked & bubbled up as if I sprayed it with accelerator.

My mad scientist side got the best of me, so I ran a few experiments with varying amounts of dye. I found that if you mix approx. 4 parts (volume) of thin CA with 1 part powdered aniline dye, you get approx. 90 seconds before it fully activates. When it activates, it's slower than when you use a spray. Also, the less dye you add, the more time you have.

[killemall8]

There are a lot of interesting reactions with dyes and stains that i have encountered.

I once was mixing minwax oil based dye with something ( I cant remember what) and it started to boil and actually ate through the cup i was mixing it in.

[Workingman]

With 90 seconds you could even do a swirl.

[Prostheta]

Quite simply, the Aniline dye is working as an accelerator. Anything that contains water or is particularly alkaline will work as an accelerator with CA. Compound (no joke intended) that with Aniline being very similar to Toluidines which are used in some accelerators.

[HuntinDoug]

I knew I should have stayed awake in chemistry class

[Prostheta]

What? They do CLASSES in chemistry?! I get all this from Breaking Bad.