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making black and red wood

Matt Meadows

Matt Meadows

Joined
May 13, 2005
Messages
171
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Location
Charleston SC
Howdy all,

Looking for some suggestions on tackling a coloring project I'm doing soon. My wife makes beaded jewelry and I occasionally turn medallions and such, and will be doing so soon for my nephew as my wife makes the necklace.

I want to dye some maple or poplar a nice, intense red, and either use black-selected walnut or dye something black (ie, I'm not paying $20 for a sliver of ebony). Going to laminate them, possibly in segments (radial pattern) or in layers, not sure.

I have tons of alkyd-based stains, but the do not penetrate past, say, half a millimeter.

Is there any way to color wood that's 1/4 inch thick? I'm more interested and concerned about the red, as I'm fine with using black walnut for the black.

Idears?
 
I have never figured out how to dye wood deeper than a few millemeters but I have never tried vacuum dying. I would think it would be easier to dye them after you turn them.
 
Have no idea if this might work, but consider taking the concept of how pressure treated lumber is made. I wonder if you could put the wood in a good old fashioned kitchen pressure cooker.

Personally, I'm probably to chicken to try this for fear of the instant re-decoration potential to my better-half's domain should something go wrong.
 
To dye beads you must turn the piece first. Heat a pot of water to very hot or just boiling and keep it on a low boil, add analyin dye (power, non toxic color). You will have to put a test piece of wood in the pot to see if it's a dark enough color. Wood floats so you are going to have to make something like a very big potatoe smasher the same diameter as the pot to push them down. You also need a wire mesh basket to fit in the pot and it must have a handle on it so you can pull it out The wire mesh basket goes into the boiling pot, add the beads. Push them down with the potatoe smasher. The beads only stay in the water for a few seconds or the lumber will expand too much. Take the smasher out then lift the basket out of the water and pour the beads onto paper, spreading them out to dry. You can use newspaper on dark colors only, otherwise use brown paper. Beads must only be one layer thick. Leave them to dry overnight. When they are dry you can drill them. If the hole size is not critical you can drill them before you dye them. To spray a clear coat on them you will need to make a rack with nails pointing up. Put the beads on the nails and walk around the rack whilst spraying. Don't overspray or they'll take ages to dry or won't dry at all. For the medalions do the same but to spray you will have to spray one side and dry and then turn them over.
There is another way to put a clear coat on using powdered carnuba wax but I'm not going to go into that right now because it's very involved and takes a lot of practise.
Please let us know how it goes.
 
AEHoyt said:
Have no idea if this might work, but consider taking the concept of how pressure treated lumber is made. I wonder if you could put the wood in a good old fashioned kitchen pressure cooker.

Personally, I'm probably to chicken to try this for fear of the instant re-decoration potential to my better-half's domain should something go wrong.
Click to expand...
😛 Put wood in a pressure cooker and you'll end up with potatoes!!!!!! Save the pressure cooker for the chicken!!!!
 
Well, maybe I'll have to buy some of the prefab wood products that are essentially specially colored wood laminated like a big block of plywood (they call it "eclipse" at woodcraft), I've seen it red and black.

This piece will be laminated together and the red dye will goof the color of the walnut while trying to make the maple red.

I appreciate the info!
 
Dyed Red Wood

I can send you a piece of wood that has been dyed and stabilized red. The color is through and through. I assure you. I have only smalll sizes but could part with a small piece if you want to give it a try. Let me know the size you need

I can tell you that a vacuum chamber will suck the dye all the way through. Pain in the tail builing a chamber though

A
 
Angelo; What can you tell me about making a vacume chamber?
Might be a pain in the--- but I am willing to give it a try if I have the material and ability to do it. Sure would like some sky blue wood.
 
I have used the pressure pot from my paint spray gun a couple times as a vacuum chamber chamber to impregnate bowls with watco oil. Just plug the lines to the gun and hook the vacuum pump to the air line. For dyeing small items you can put the dye and the parts into a coffee can and set that into the pressure pot so that you dont need to use so much dye. Having the dye in a seperate can also saves having to clean out the pot when you are done.
 
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