Dip Dyeing Spirit Based Dyes

[Andrew Chee]

Hello all. I've been trying my hands on dip dyeing larger pieces of leather. Previously I've been using a preval spray bottle. My coverage technique has not been great and the penetration of course is only on the top so I thought I'd try dip dyeing.

I purchased some Fiebings spirit based dye in Cordovan. I tried dipping that straight and found it way too dark. It was almost like black. I cut the dye with denatured alcohol to 10 parts alcohol, 1 part dye and it's getting to the point of being somewhat light enough.

I did some small test scraps where I submerge a piece of regular tooling leather (about 5oz) for 5 seconds, take it out, and wipe off the excess. Then I leave it to dry overnight. The dye penetration is fine but the next day I find the leather very stiff. I'm thinking that the alcohol in the dye is probably drying out the leather quite a bit. What can I do about this? I tried spraying with mink oil after dye. I tried putting conditioners back on after the leather dye dries. Both of these have helped a little bit but the leather is still much dryer then before.

I want to use this leather for a bag. The largest panel I have to dye is about 15" x 15". I'm not looking for super soft leather but I want it to be at least as soft as the original condition of the leather before dyeing.

Anyways, any help in this matter would be greatly appreciated. Thanks.

Andrew

[dbusarow]

Try Fiebings Leather Stain. It mixes with neatsfoot oil. It only comes in black, walnut, cherry and golden oak but if you can live with that it does a real nice job.

Dan

[Andrew Chee]

Try Fiebings Leather Stain. It mixes with neatsfoot oil. It only comes in black, walnut, cherry and golden oak but if you can live with that it does a real nice job.

Dan

I might try that. What is your process for using this?

Andrew

[dbusarow]

I haven't dyed anything quite that large with this stuff. I pour the oil/stain into a metal pie plate (around 9-10" I would guess) and slip the piece to be dyed in for about 2 seconds. Pull it out, let it drip dry over pan, then wipe with sheep skin to remove the excess.

Dan

[Kcinnick]

I dip dye in a mixture of 1 part dye 5 parts alcohol. I oil after I dye to get it back to its original softness. It darkens the leather somewhat, but comes out nice after a day or two of the oil evening back out into the leather. Even on Holsters, as long as you don't put more oil in than you take out you will be fine. From reading posts on here some people are scared of neatsfoot oil, but I talked to one of the most famous holster makers in the world and he use to dunk his holsters in oil and they still kept their shape.

I never put oil on the back side of the leather, always the hair side, the back side soaks it up too fast.

Just my 2 cents from experimenting. I tried at first with very little oil because that was what was suppose to be done, but once I started oiling liberally I got much better results.