Tutorial for making dyes

[Guest Litchfield Custom Gutars]

This does NOT save money, but will make small batches of color, and will last for years to come, due to the poly being UV resistant.

Ok, before anyone says anything about UV fading, bear in mind that the food color is water based dye (aka aniline) and mixed with the poly, it has more stability than one would think.

In this tutorial, I made a yellow dye, but it can be used to make green, blue, red, purple, and so on. I will also include my recipes for other colors.

First off, you will need one 8 oz. can of minwax polycrylic. Any waterbased poly will work, but water based is the key word. You will also need between one and five 1 oz. bottles of the desired color. In this tut I used 2 bottles of yellow, and it came out wrong. I am actually glad this happened, so that I can show how to correct this.

After you have gathered your supplies, use a plastic tub, I like the sour cream ones, but any will do. Empty the contents of the dye bottle(s) into the tub. If you see fit, wear some rubber gloves. I have found that the food dye is too thin for the glove to do much good, but you judge for yourself.

Now empty the whole can of poly into the tub carefully. The splash can do some damage to clothes.

Now, put the lid on the tub and shake it just enough to stir the dye and poly together. Take the lid off and look at it. Then test it out on some scrap wood.

As you can see, it came out a little orange. This is because there is too much color. Add some poly to it and when you are satisfied, you are done. Mine turned out better, and I used it to practice my carribean burst, which I have not perfected as yet. It is the yellow in the picture below.

For red, I use 5 bottles of dye, and one can of poly

Green, also 5 bottles and one can.

Blue, 2 bottles and one can.

Purple to taste mixing red and blue.

Now you can and should experiment to find your own recipes, because my eyes will like different mixtures than yours.

[jefm]

Hmmm....pretty cool...

I've always wondered how those worked

[fidgec94]

Being of simple mind......could you use the dyed poly as the final finish or would you then have to clear the body as well with something else? I also get rather confused with all the products and terminology...when you say 'poly', i assume you mena polyurethane?

[Guest Litchfield Custom Gutars]

I suppose one could use it as a topcoat, but I wouldnt. The shine isnt there and is it still water souluble. You can top coat with anything including nitro.

And by poly, I do indeed mean polyurethane, in this case the water based variety. That is what the Minwax Poly crylic is.

[canuckguitarist]

thats gonna be a pretty cool looking carrie-burst!

[renablistic]

yes, if i ain't mistaken, thats a piece of flamed wood... (or is it just the pic?) If i had ANY pice of flamed maple, I would NEVER use it as practice!! Tell me you're not just gonna throw that away..

OOPS... sorry about the hijack... it was a personal demon that needed exersicing...

[guitar_ed]

Howdy,

Another tool, at least that I found useful, is a color wheel. If you are like me and have no sense of how to mix colors, it might cut down some of the trial & error.

As for containers or jars, I used to use baby food jars. But my baby is too old now, so no jars. I finally spent the bucks and bought some mason jars.

Guitar Ed

[DannoG]

Cool tutorial. I think experimenting with optional materials is a good thing. Just need to mention that aniline does not mean water - based. Aniline dye is also poisonous, so I would hope nobody would confuse it with food dye.

[Guest Litchfield Custom Gutars]

yes, if i ain't mistaken, thats a piece of flamed wood... (or is it just the pic?) If i had ANY pice of flamed maple, I would NEVER use it as practice!! Tell me you're not just gonna throw that away.. 

OOPS... sorry about the hijack... it was a personal demon that needed exersicing...

Well, yes that is flamed wood, although it is flamed cherry. I am NOT scrapping it. I will sand that off after I bookmatch it. I am working on my carrieburst technique on that piece beacuse then I know EXACTLY what it will look like in the end.

[Guest Litchfield Custom Gutars]

should this be pinned brian?

Also, this is not the std correct way, but it is simple and effective

[Devon Headen]

I'd like to use this, but first I want to be sure. I can shoot nitro lacquer over this right? I always thought nitro and poly weren't compatible.

Devon

[Guest Litchfield Custom Gutars]

I shot a nitro sealer over the purple, and then poly. Waterbased poly in the dye is very neutral. Oil based poly is not. It can go over nitro, but nitro cant go over it.

[Devon Headen]

Ok...didn't have use of any waterbased poly, so I used just water with food coloring to try to get a nice dark blue. I mized probably 7 drops of blue with a tiny bit of water (very strong solution). The color came out as a turquoise color. I wiped several coats, and it is, like Drak said, a cartoon color. Very, very very, bright green-blue. Any hints? should I just get the poly?

Thanks,

Devon

[erikbojerik]

The water-based Minwax polycrylic is actually a bit less clear (milky) than the regular Minwax polyurethane, although you need really thick coats to tell. A thin dye coat would be fine, then you could clear with the regular poly and buff out.

If you're using dye+water, you might need to sand flat again as the water will raise the wood grain.

[Guest Litchfield Custom Gutars]

I'd just use the poly. The milkyness seems to make the color stable..

And now that I know aniline isnt water based.....sorry.

[Librero]

It's a little belated, but thank you for the tutorial.

I adapted your methods in finishing my Strat copy.

Minwax stuff is extremely hard to come by and very expensive here, so I looked for a substitute. I used ACE Hardware's Poly-Finish (which was less than half the price of the MinWax Polycrilic). I imagine it *looks* like the MinWax: milky white color. I mixed that with local green food color. I've forgotten the proportions, though.

I did lay about six coatings, though, which was much more than I had planned. I couldn't help it. After applying sanding sealer and clear lacquer:

It's been four months since I finished the paint job. So far so good.

[JohnJohn]

That's a great bit of info-thanks for sharing.Btw are purple and yellow the onle clours that you spray for a Carriburst?

Love the effect-but being colourblind I'm not 100% on all the colours

[Guest Litchfield Custom Gutars]

That's a great bit of info-thanks for sharing.Btw are purple and yellow the onle clours that you spray for a Carriburst?

Love the effect-but being colourblind I'm not 100% on all the colours

I know how ya feel, thats why God gave me a non colorblind wife.

As for the cartoon blue...the food dye has water in it already. I use about a whole bottle to get a sky blue. This has no real formula, just mix until you like it.

And the green on the strat looks killer.

[Guest Litchfield Custom Gutars]

And blue and yellow are the bursted colors in the carrie.

[Librero]

And the green on the strat looks killer.

Thanks!

It's taken a bit of a beating since it got put together, though. I'm planning on spraying some more coats of lacquer on it after the work on my other guitars are through.

[darren wilson]

I'm still not entirely sold on the UV stability of food-grade colouring.

I once did a package design for a fruit beverage line, and when they were all done, i put the bottles on the window sill of my office. After a few months, the pink and orange drinks were clear.

I'd want to see a food-dyed guitar after a few months of regular UV exposure before committing to it.

[Librero]

Regular UV exposure... Do you have any specific parameters in mind?

I live in a tropical country. And I left my strat body under the sun to dry and cure as long and often as I could for more than a month. It was regularly exposed to direct sunlight and temperatures well over 85 degrees Farenheit.

Like I said, so far so good. But now I wouldn't dare to do further tests. Those conditions will ruin the rest of my guitar.

Maybe the PolyCrylic does make a difference. I really hope it does because I'll be doing the same process on a friend's guitar body soon.

[Devon Headen]

hmmm..I'm thinking that the blue just gets that color when diluted...I'm gonna try some more stuff with it in a bit..I'm trying to figure out what colors I need to mix to get a nice deep blue. At this point I'm thinking that I'm gonna just spray a toner blue on this guitar anyway (gonna try epoxy to fill a crack, so I don't think wipe-on would work. I might just order Stewmac's Metallic dye blue, and make a toner with nitro. If I do this I'm guessing that I fill the grain/crack, then shoot the toner, then shoot a bit of clear? Anyway, too many other projects going, it'll probably be awhile before I get to that.

[MikeB]

i say pin, seems useful, interests me! not too bad pics Litch

[westhemann]

I'm still not entirely sold on the UV stability of food-grade colouring.

me either.i will pay the extra couple of bucks for the fade resistant stuff.it would suck to have a guitar go clear after a few years.a few bucks aint worth it imo