First Dye Job--I Think I Must Be Doing Something Wrong! Advice?

[wmcmanus]

Hi all. Relative beginner here. I finally found some dye locally. I found a local shoemaker that was willing to sell me a babyfood jar full of dye, as well as some leather cream and sealant. He said he can't get them locally either, he imports it all from China.

Here's an album of my completed dye job

Anyways--I did the following:

1) applied the die on thick with a piece of cotton. I did two coats. After the second coat I let it dry for about 24 hours. I don't know what kind of dye this is, but it's very very thick and seems oil based.

2) I buffed the heck out of it until it got shiny and no color came off on the buffing cloth.

3) applied the cream, waited a few hours, applied again. waited overnight.

4) applied the spray sealant. waited a few hours then buffed.

Now here are my problems:

1) The finish feels very "plasticky" it no longer really feels like natural leather. Is this because of the kind of dye I'm using? Or something wrong with my application process.

2) The leather cream seemed to dissolve the dye and make it come up (that's where there are patchy areas in my dye job. It was completely covered but the cream made it come up.) I assume I need a different type of oil because this one has some solvent in it. A new kind of oil will be next on my list. I might start with olive oil if i can't find anything more specific to leather.

3) The leather gets finger prints on it now.

Any tips on what I'm doing wrong? Or things I should try differently?

I'm probably 6 or 7k miles from the nearest Tandy, so looking for advice on how to work with what I've got. Thanks as always! I know there's a lot of wisdom around here.

[thekid77]

Hi all. Relative beginner here. I finally found some dye locally. I found a local shoemaker that was willing to sell me a babyfood jar full of dye, as well as some leather cream and sealant. He said he can't get them locally either, he imports it all from China.

Here's an album of my completed dye job

Anyways--I did the following:

1) applied the die on thick with a piece of cotton. I did two coats. After the second coat I let it dry for about 24 hours. I don't know what kind of dye this is, but it's very very thick and seems oil based.

2) I buffed the heck out of it until it got shiny and no color came off on the buffing cloth.

3) applied the cream, waited a few hours, applied again. waited overnight.

4) applied the spray sealant. waited a few hours then buffed.

Now here are my problems:

1) The finish feels very "plasticky" it no longer really feels like natural leather. Is this because of the kind of dye I'm using? Or something wrong with my application process.

2) The leather cream seemed to dissolve the dye and make it come up (that's where there are patchy areas in my dye job. It was completely covered but the cream made it come up.) I assume I need a different type of oil because this one has some solvent in it. A new kind of oil will be next on my list. I might start with olive oil if i can't find anything more specific to leather.

3) The leather gets finger prints on it now.

Any tips on what I'm doing wrong? Or things I should try differently?

I'm probably 6 or 7k miles from the nearest Tandy, so looking for advice on how to work with what I've got. Thanks as always! I know there's a lot of wisdom around here.

I don't have all the answers, but here goes...

If the finish looks plasticky, it could be the type of finish you're using. If it's not that, it could be that you are applying too thick a coat. If that happens, the leather will look like plastic because the finish has filled all the pores of the leather and is just sitting on top of the grain...with that being said, I prefer to use acrylic resolene cut 50/50 water:resolene. I keep it in a small bottle, and when I'm going to apply finish to the leather, I take a couple paper towels and wad them up, then wrap a piece of old clean cotton t-shirt around the paper towel ball. I'll cover the mouth of the bottle with the resolene and loightly tip it onto the cotton ball. Then I blot the excess resolene off onto a separate paper towel and apply the finish to the leather using either a swiping or a circular motion. This results in an extremely light coat of acrylic on the leather. The first light coat will leave a dull matte finish. You need to wait until that coat dries (how long depends on the climnate/humidity)...then apply the second coat the same way as the first coat...you can buff the resolene with a piece of wool in between coats which will work to polish the resolene and buff out any streaks that may appear. It's more work this way, but the end result is just a better looking finish and you have much more control over how much finish you're leaving on the leather.

I know you said you're trying to work with what you have, but for future reference....I was dying a bunch of things black with the tandy eco-flo stuff and was getting a lot of dye lift and the dye wasn't penetrating the leather very well (especially the black dye)....I had purchased their Tandy Pro Waterstain (black) and this stuff is a whole different animal.....it penetrates the leather well, and 24 hours after applying it, you can run the piece of leather under water scrubbing the surface and will not get any dye coming out at all....mind you, this is BEFORE even applying any kind of surface finish to it.........you might try it if you're having dye lift problems......

a lot of people will tell you to stay away from the Tandy stuff, and I do agree that they put out some pretty bad products at times but I can tell you with certainty that the Waterstain in Black stays put really really well...hope this helps!!!

[wmcmanus]

Great thank you for the advice. There's a chance I'm putting it on too thick. I saw some tutorial videos where people where even dipping whole pieces into the dye, so I didn't know that was possible.

On a reddit forum someone suggested that the finisher I'm using is causing the plastic feel. I'm going to try a few pieces without that. Here's a few pictures to see the consistency of the dye I'm using. And also about how thick I was putting it on for the first coat. I waited until it dried and put on a second coat so it was completely covered though, so maybe that was the problem?

[thekid77]

Great thank you for the advice. There's a chance I'm putting it on too thick. I saw some tutorial videos where people where even dipping whole pieces into the dye, so I didn't know that was possible.

On a reddit forum someone suggested that the finisher I'm using is causing the plastic feel. I'm going to try a few pieces without that. Here's a few pictures to see the consistency of the dye I'm using. And also about how thick I was putting it on for the first coat. I waited until it dried and put on a second coat so it was completely covered though, so maybe that was the problem?

Again, I'm no expert, but that stuff looks like paint...it looks to be too thick for the leather to even absorb it....what is the base? water-based? oil-based?

I totally understand wanting to work with what you already have but in the future get some quality leather dye......Fiebings makes good dyes that penetrate the leather well. You should be able to get the Fiebings oil dyes as long as you're not in CA. Here in California, they ban it if it works....

[wmcmanus]

Thanks thekid77. I'm actually in a developing country 6 or 7 thousand miles from California, so it's even harder for me to get those brands you know (fiebings, etc.) than it is for you guys in CA. I tried to order some once on Amazon, but was seized by customs because it wasn't shipped with a MSDS. And after that I gave up.

It's oil based. It dries to a matte finish that buffs out pretty easily. I compared that to how an acrylic paint or edge paint looks when applied in the same way and it's totally different. Although that doesn't mean that it's still not a paint. It just acts a bit differently than the paints I know, and that's why I was inclined to think it's a dye.