Did I mess up making vinegaroon

[crazytailorlady]

Hey everyone,

I found a vinegaroon recipe here: https://leatherworker.net/forum/topic/73637-my-guide-to-the-best-vinegaroon-youve-ever-made/#comment-482966 after it was recomended to me as a natural dye. Here is what I did:

I bought steel wool for dishwashing from a local store. I had lots of red wine vinegar (6 percent acid). I took a glass jar and put the wool in an then submerged the wool in it. I left it like that for a day and then I tried it on some vegtan leather I had laying around. Nothing happened. I left it for another day and same thing, no blacking. There were bubbles in the solutiob once and I very carefully stirred them away but that was only a few hours after the wool had been sitting there. Now in the recipe it says that the full strenght is reached in twelve hours but mine does nothing after two days. Did I use wrong kind of vinegar or maybe there is something wrong with the wool?

Thanks in advance!

 

 

[fredk]

Wrong steel wool. Woolies for dish washing have soap and rust inhibitors on them. Get pads from a DIY or hardware store. Use neat distilled white vinegar diluted with some water. Allow air to get to the wool in the vinegar solution

[tsunkasapa]

It also helps to rinse the steel wool (again, for WOODWORKING) with alcohol to remove any oil.

[Chakotay]

here's my vinegaroon recipe:

 

[crazytailorlady]

Thanks everyone! I'll try with different wool and use white vinegar instead.

[crazytailorlady]

Update guys!

I bought white vinegar but every hardware store somehow went out of stock for steel wool so, improvisation time. I took a rust brush and scraped the life out of a dishwashing woolie. Then I cut it into tiny pieces using scissors. I also got some pieces of an iron nail (removed the rust). I left all of that covered in vinegar in a glass jar. In a few hours there were bubbles everywhere. I mixed it a bit. In 12 hours I had 'roon of moderate strenght, in 2 days it blackens amazing. I'm working on a project right now so I'll post images when its done. A great thanks for all of the help!

P.S. I neutralized blackened leather by soaking it in a sodium hydrogen bicarbonate solution. Color holds.

[Matt S]

Well done getting it working, but easy on the sodium bicarb. Veg tanned leather is supposed to be mildly acidic (pH around 3-4 IIRC), and if you take it above its as-made pH it'll break down quite quickly. On the rare instance I use vinegaroon type products I just wash the thing out in plain water rather than adding bases. This brings the pH up a little, which is close enough to its "natural" pH that I think it makes little odds.

[chuck123wapati]

2 hours ago, crazytailorlady said:

Update guys!

I bought white vinegar but every hardware store somehow went out of stock for steel wool so, improvisation time. I took a rust brush and scraped the life out of a dishwashing woolie. Then I cut it into tiny pieces using scissors. I also got some pieces of an iron nail (removed the rust). I left all of that covered in vinegar in a glass jar. In a few hours there were bubbles everywhere. I mixed it a bit. In 12 hours I had 'roon of moderate strenght, in 2 days it blackens amazing. I'm working on a project right now so I'll post images when its done. A great thanks for all of the help!

P.S. I neutralized blackened leather by soaking it in a sodium hydrogen bicarbonate solution. Color holds.

Awesome!!!!  steel wool works fast but any regular iron of will work Nails for example . it doesn't have to be just steel wool if you ever run into this problem again..

[crazytailorlady]

18 minutes ago, chuck123wapati said:

Awesome!!!!  steel wool works fast but any regular iron of will work Nails for example . it doesn't have to be just steel wool if you ever run into this problem again..

Yup, definitely noted that. I'll be making lots of 'roon for my project(s) so there's ny chance to experiment. The fun part of this was: I was cutting some old leather before using the dye and I had a ton of fine leather dust on my hands. Guess what happened when some 'roon got on those hands...

[chuck123wapati]

lol i have a piece of leather speckled because i was sanding a knife  by it as soon as i wetted it to tool .......tiny black speckles. the iron reacts with the tannins used in the tanning process turning the leather black so any iron that touches it wet will turn it.