Source for dyed (green) bottle stopper blanks

When I make small Christmas stuff and want some color, I use Ritz (sp?) clothes dye (color fast, UV resistant) mixed with anhydrous alcohol. The anhydrous alcohol will actually suck out some of the moisture in the wood and replace it with the dye/alcohol mixture. I do this when I make little wooden Christmas light bulbs in red and green. Oddly enough, I have to go to a fabric/hobby store to get the exact color I am looking for, a kind of "pool table felt" green.

Cut your blank to shape, sand it, final sand it. Drop it in the dye mix. Leave it there overnight. Take it out and fiber pad/steel wool it, then if you have raised grain issues, drop it back in again overnight. Final sand and polish as usual. Make sure you give it a chance to dry properly between sandings and testing as you will have green everywhere if you don't.

Soft woods don't need overnight and will take in so much dye you will think it is baked in But a small, burly knot that doesn't take the dye really well surrounded by softer woods looks fantastic. Hard wood times vary, as does spalted materials. I experimented with times and dye mixes a lot, and now I just mix in a teaspoon of dye and put in pint of alcohol and let them swim in it.

You have latex gloves or tongs for this, right?

A word of warning: Mix your dye with distilled water if you are working with spalted wood as the alcohol will destroy the ink lines we all like so much.

You can do a million stoppers this way for pennies.

You could also use Behlen's green wood dye available at Amazon. I have no personal experience with it.

Robert

I like the suggestion on dying my own, but how deep does the dye penetrate?

I need pretty deep color because I actually glue up 2 parts for a stopper that looks like a Thistle. Here's the idea but in polyester:

Maybe I'll get the one currently on the lathe photographed. So after gluing the green and purple parts together I'd need to clean it up some -- hence the need for good penetration of the dye.

Thanks

Not trying to be cagey, but it depends on the wood. A piece of soft maple will haul in the dye, a piece of burly oak will not. If you have some pieces that you are willing to try this on as an experiment, it would probably be worth your while. (C'mon... what turner doesn't have dozens of little nubs of this and that looking for a home?)

You know what I mean! ;^)

Put a piece of the wood you are thinking of making your stopper from in the dye and leave it overnight. Dry it out and cut a cross section with a saw. That will tell you how THAT particular piece will react. I have seen soft maple come out of a long soak of this stuff with about 1/8 penetration. On your woodturning, that means you would only have to get that little stopper within 1/4" of final shape. Not hard.

You won't ever get the same results from your house as they dye those pieces under something like 60,000 pounds of applied pressure, injecting them with some resin as well at the same time to help stabilize the blanks. I have read some ridiculous numbers on the fully stabilized blanks, so much so I wouldn't even post them.

The reason I said above to cut most of your shape before you dye was to make sure you minimized your penetration problems. You cut the raw wood into shape, sand it to finish, and then dip in your dye again if you have some irregularities in the finish.

Here's why I don't worry too much about Those dyes are pretty forgiving. If you sand off a little too much and it looks uneven, even after you assemble, you can touch up the dye job before finishing with a .10 artist's brush and a quick swipe with a rag The more burl and swirl the piece has the less chance anyone will ever have of detecting color differences.

What are you using for your final finish?

Another question, are you using plated chrome stoppers or Ruth Niles' stainless stoppers?

Robert

Yes, I do. Every time I try to walk across the shop without tripping.

I did go get a nice piece of maple burl yesterday and stuck a sliver into some TransTint (water soluble) dye yesterday for about 1.5hrs. Pretty much no penetration.

I'm thinking if I can get a vacuum pump I might try this:

Hmm.. Anyone in the Phoenix area got a vacuum system I could borrow? > > What are you using for your final finish? > I had been using shellac and wax, but was considering moving to BLO/cyanoacrylate.

Think about it. The lower the density/SG of the wood, the more spaces versus places, since all wood's pretty much the same sugars. Means aspen and such are going to give you the best penetration versus time.

You can create a sort of mini vacuum by warming the wood and placing it into the dye. Lower pressure of the heated and expanded air will draw as it cools.

That's why I put in the earlier post to mix with alcohol. It is miscible with water, and will actually pull the surface moisture out of the wood to a small extent, penetrating more than water, bringing the dye along with it.

this:

On small pieces I have heard of some successes using a food vacuum, and simply cycling the vacuum several times. The object to be dyed are put in a vacuum canister (not the bags) and covered with the dye solution then cycled.

Are you buying those from Arizona Silhouette?

As for finish, I line mine all up stuck on dowels and spray them with a couple of coats of lacquer from a rattle can. Then assemble. If my finish is where I want it I don't buff or anything else before packaging.

I haven't made that many, but I have been approached by someone that wants to see if I could make a lot of them for him to give as gifts in his business. As when I was making pens, it will probably work fine at first, but then so many will be doing it that the prices will drop to near nothing.

I get from $17.50 (chrome) and up to $25 (stainless) and everything in between for one of these. You? Anyone else?

Robert

RUBBISH! If it mixes, it merely dilutes. Water and alcohol molecules both find their way out to and are carried away in air. The more volatile alcohol finds its way out at a faster rate than the less-volatile water.

Alcohol mix dyes are used because they don't raise the grain as much as water mix. The reason the grain raises with water mix is that the water gets involved in hydrogen-bonding with the sugars, fattening them up. The wood boys refer to it as "bulking." Alcohols aren't as polar and prone.

And it carries no surface moisture with it? Should I surmise that when I wash my hands with anhydrous alcohol to clean them and they turn crusty and white that NO moisture was carried away? I doubt it. They seem pretty dry and without surface moisture to me.

In this instance, it works for me. YMMV. I know you well enough from this venue George that there is little room or tolerance in your world for contradiction to your own beliefs, but the alcohol testing I did with Behlen's Solar Lux did indeed penetrate significantly more on identical pieces of wood over the same period of time. >> I > I > I Alcohol mix dyes are used because they don't raise the grain as much as

My explanation may not have suited you in so far as how the dye penetration process works, but I believe yours to be oversimplified. I would think of you would try a simple penetration test yourself you would quite probably see a difference. After reading several well researched treatises by woodturners on alcohol drying and the use of alcohol as a carrier when dyeing or staining, there are two distinct camps with two different sets of supporting evidence.

Obviously we don't belong to the same one.

Robert

And add in the structure of the wood, porosity of the cellular walls, etc. Best to try a sample of your board and find out.

Nice idea.

Thanks

I didn't miss that detail, I just had the water based already mixed up. Now to repeat with alcohol and a longer soak.

this:

>>I have some of the plated chrome stoppers, but my newest order >>was all stainless. >

Yes. Know of a cheaper place? Although Bill's service is hard to beat.

I was selling the polyester for $20 and the wood ones for $25 this summer. But that was at Thistle (class of sailboat) Nationals- which is why they're shaped like Thistles.

I'm going with nailshooter here. Assuming you've got anhydrous alcohol, the water will want to equilize the concentrations inside the wood with that (0%) outside. Thus, water should exit the wood. Since nature abhors a vacuum, alcohol *should* work its way in to replace the water taking the dye with it.

The grain-raising (or lack thereof) may be the most common reason alcohol dyes are used, but there can be other useful properties.

I got it now. When I looked at the pic you linked, I thought it looked pretty spiff, but when looking at them didn't get the actual reason for the thistle design.

For years, I have heard nothing but great stuff about AS in regards to their service and product. That says a lot to me. I have been purchasing from Craft Supplies, but probably won't anymore as they were only offering chrome stoppers. Whether true or not, the hue and cry is on to get rid of the chrome stoppers as the story goes that the chrome comes off. Mine haven't, nor have the ones I have gifted.

I was thinking about buying mine from Ruth Niles, another person whom there hasn't been an unkind word spoken. She used to frequent the forums and newsgroups more often, but I think she just got too busy. Seems to be a nice lady. Her site:

Thanks for the price info. It lets me know I am about where I need to be. I am not that happy with the pricing, as it takes too long to make to get $10 - $15 from it by the time you are finished. (We'll leave out postage, finishing materials, transportation costs, etc.) I am thinking of going another route with this, if you are interested, let me know here and we can contact each other.

I am surprised no one else chimed in with their stopper prices. Mac? Nothing? I can't believe you aren't selling tequila toppers (not stoppers!) down there south of the border.

Robert

Uh, the reason they're dry is because you've removed oils. Fortunately your body will produce more.

Take a quick look at how distillation works and you'll see what's happening. The azeotrope is ~95/5 % with ethanol. So with as little available water and as large a percentage of _anhydrous_ alcohol, it is what's evaporating. That azeotrope business is what makes methanol a good denaturant. ethanol/methanol azeotrope makes it near impossible to redistill.

You might have read before you responded. Didn't say it wouldn't penetrate farther. Just might, given that alcohol moves freely without being bound to the sugars like water. If the carrier has greater cohesion than adhesion, it should.

Go with this instead.

Remember that air already contains a pretty good amount of water, unless you're as dry as a heated house in the middle of winter.

What a difference a word makes! Remember the popular song, "Three Little Words"? In an otherwise thoughtful post to this thread, merely changing "Rubbish" to "In MY Opinion" or "From what I've read" would have changed the thrust of the discussion and made reading different takes from two valued and respected friends more comfortable. There seems to be a set of unresolved controversies that are like an itch that never heals and we woodturners seem to enjoy scratching til it bleeds. Drying and dying are quite itchy. :)

I mean this only as an idle observation. Absolutely not as a "Can't we all just get along?" pabalum or a "Now-Now children" puffed up presumption from an unelected word policeman. I seem to never learn that when two friends disagree, it is better not to make observations. Now, as for those fried green bottle stoppers ...! :)

Turn to Safety, Arch Fortiter

Idling a bit myself until the user of this device I'm building can get the interior dimensions validated.

Words are chosen by their users to convey thoughts. Alcohol drying is rubbish, and thus labeled as such. It violates the demonstrable laws of physical chemistry, as has been referenced repeatedly; it violates simple good sense, as has been stated repeatedly. Sooner it is consigned to the rubbish heap the better.

As one of the few who have actually done _controlled_ experiments with alcohol and simple open air drying on a number of species of wood, including, I might add, the use of an alcohol-based dye to ascertain penetration on the various grain orientations, I can say that the rubbish appelation it is _not_ an opinion, but fact. Kind of suspected it all along, given that distillation is based on the more rapid evaporation of alcohol versus water.

I'll even say that assertions involving stabilization of wood by soaking in ethanol (other alcohols with boiling points above water are different) is purely subjective. Soaked and unsoaked pieces with the same grain orientation distorted to the same degree and in the same direction. Kind of suspected that too, since alcoholic beverages have been aged and stored in wood without diminishing their potency (less the differential evaporation, for the nit-pickers) for millenia. If the alcohol stayed behind to stabilize the wood you can bet it wouldn't be stored there.

I just dropped in on Dave's blog, and he still has not documented a controlled experiment to validate his assertions.

So, rather than encourage people to rely on magic, I would encourage them to take advantage of the splendid research available in the FPL site. Then they can develop their own set of tradeoffs for redesign room versus readiness in roughing. Our tax dollars were not wasted on these guys. They have been right every time I've challenged their data, though I still have to experiment to satisfy my own curiosity occasionally.

That might well be. But take off your lab coat and put your glasses.

Before you screamed RUBBISH! and started your well known diatribe on the stupidity of alcohol drying, I ask you this: WHERE did I say anything about alcohol drying? I am not sure where you jumped off the cliff on this, but a careful reread on your part of this entire thread will reveal:

Nowhere did I say that alcohol drying did, or did not work. No screaming needed. I never addressed that subject in any way. I don't personally see how alcohol drying could actually work, but that is another subject. There are those that do, and I say good for them. Not "stupid" them.

You even make my case (again, read carefully) about SURFACE moisture being removed when you said in response to my example of moisture being removed from my hands:

body will produce more.

Thanks for the heads up. I don't want dry skin forever. I am guessing though, you assume that moisture (which could indeed be oils) cannot be pulled from the surface of wood when alcohol mixes with it, then evaporates off taking some of the moisture with it. NOTE: I always say "surface".

If you jumped to any other conclusion than surface treatments, please reread my comment about not getting the same results at home as you get from a factory. In no way do I ever talk about any kind of deep penetration due to alcohol "drying". Think surface moisture. In context, all NS needs is enough penetration to get the job done. Besides... remember

But then, you step up to further reinforce my point in your own smarmy way:

No, earlier you did say

mix. The reason the grain raises

Again, I am wondering where you land on this issue. For someone that obviously prides themselves on their attention to the detail, early on in this thread you ignored my original statement about alcohol assisting in the dye penetration, asserting on that it doesn't raise the grain.

So I am sticking with what I originally wrote, and for the life of me I cannot see where we disagree:

- Water is miscible with alcohol

- Alcohol will assist in SURFACE removal of moisture/oils of wood

- A mix of alcohol/dye will penetrate more than water/dye mix

I cannot find where you disagree with any of that, except your original scream of "RUBBISH!"

Was all this diatribe on your part just a hijack of a thread so you could verbalize your opinions on alcohol drying? Did you think I was a proponent of alcohol drying? Anyone that has been around here for awhile knows your opinions on drying.

Was I too obtuse in my statement? It seems from your subsequent posts that maybe you misunderstood those two sentences.

Robert

Undoubtedly. But carrying the mantle of self righteousness requires a certain vocabulary. No doubt, it has started many a flame war.

Sadly, it seems the internet brings out the best and worst of folks, and they don't really seem to relate well to one another when sitting in front of screen.

And for years now, the art of respectful disagreement has been lost. I usually respect another's opinion enough (or simply don't care about it!) to let things go, or pose my own thoughts as a hypothesis or a question.

I rarely bitch slap anyone these days.

I am not a hard line kind of guy, as over my years in the trades have seen many things work that probably shouldn't. I have learned a healthy respect for others pays good dividends, even if you disagree with them.

And when you have an open forum such as this, I think it is important to remember there are probably 10 times the amount of lurkers as there are posters. While a poster may have a valid or invalid point, it may be posted as an opinion. And no one wants to see their opinion stomped on in a rude, bullying way.

And as is the case of this group, many simply don't participate. It is too easy to walk off from an annoying thread. Reading this forum for many probably consists of a quick skim (if there is actually anything new to read) and then off. It used to be pretty lively around here. I remember in the late 90s there were a ton of posts every day.

I don't want to see this group fall in to the ways of the BBQ newsgroup. There are a about 3 guys there that jump all over anyone that asks a dumb question, or has an opinion different from theirs. Now mind you .... bbq is subjective. If you don't like the taste of something and I do, I don't expect to be attacked for my tasted buds. And yet it happens.

Mentioning that I liked mesquite mixed in with my bbq, I had a guy from Austin get so upset with me that after a couple of emails he told me my bbq tastes "like shit" (how he would know from 100 miles away is beyond me) and that he would come down and kick my ass (literally!) anytime I was up to it.

I think of these newsgroups as the shoolyard of the internet. Anyone can do or say what they please when they please. But since we have no hall monitors, teachers, or anyone else to make sure that we "play well with others" it is up to us to make sure we do.

Robert

i've made some for my glass work, and worked with ruth on her steel tab design for glassworkers. i get between 25 and 40 for them, depending upon if they're 2 sided and how much glass i've added. my last batch of stoppers cost me about .90/each but the plating is incredibly thin, discolors, corrodes, and peels off, so you really do get your money's worth.

here's what i used:

regards, charlie