My guide to the best vinegaroon you've ever made.

[327fed]

Give it about 3 days. 

[chuck123wapati]

1 hour ago, Klara said:

kop4 wrote that we should keep oxygen, i. e. air out:

"Oxygen messes with this system. Obviously there is oxygen in the atmosphere and dissolved in your solution, and this can oxidize the iron ions – it will take them from the 2+ state to the 3+ state. Fe3+ or iron(III) is NOT what we want, because it is orange and gross and not soluble in water. If this forms, it creates an orange/brown powdery solid that sinks to the bottom of the jar. To prevent the oxidation of the iron in solution, we need to keep the pH LOW and keep the oxygen out of the system as much as possible – by not pouring or shaking the solution. "

But I admit that I was to lazy to find the air lock so I did just leave the lid on loosely. And I don't think that's the problem - but there is a problem: After 24 hours the solution just doesn't dye. One leather gets a very light grey touch, the other nothing. Maybe I didn't use enough steel wool? Does anybody have a ratio of steel to vinegar?

 

its takes longer than 24 hrs just put some steel wool in a jar cover it with vinegar, put the lid on loose and forget about it for at least a few days it will get stronger the more iron that is dissolved. I have a jar that is over a year old. This stuff has been made for centuries its not rocket science.  don't overthink it no need.

[fredk]

oh, this reminds me, I have a jar of vinegaroon maturing in jar in a corner of my kitchen. I think I started it early last summer (2020) I just used a nail to punch a few holes in the screw-top to let the gasses out

Do you think it might be ready?

How is it applied?

[chuck123wapati]

17 minutes ago, fredk said:

oh, this reminds me, I have a jar of vinegaroon maturing in jar in a corner of my kitchen. I think I started it early last summer (2020) I just used a nail to punch a few holes in the screw-top to let the gasses out

Do you think it might be ready?

How is it applied?

it will be ready on the first full moon of the second month of the third year when the blue wooly tater bug flies south. 

i apply it with a cold beer! but some good home made Irish whiskey will work also.

[fredk]

6 minutes ago, chuck123wapati said:

it will be ready on the first full moon of the second month of the third year when the blue wooly tater bug flies south. 

Aye, well I'll have to wait till then cos mine is looking like muddy water

Or start a fresh jar

7 minutes ago, chuck123wapati said:

i apply it with a cold beer! but some good home made Irish whiskey will work also.

Cold beer I can do, or mead

Thanks for spelling whiskey the correct way!

[Atalanta]

Interesting. I get high strength vinegar at HMart (29-31% as opposed to 5%) and use it as an herbicide. Would this work or should it be 5%? And it seems the general consensus is to just rinse it off rather than give it a baking soda bath. 

[fairfarren]

On 3/1/2021 at 4:36 PM, Matt S said:

I'll see if I can dig out my notes but that was a few moves ago so I'm not confident I'll be able to find them. I feel some experiments coming on...

Any luck on searching for those notes? Baby leatherworker here very interested in your findings

[RW6mm]

On 3/1/2021 at 6:17 AM, Matt S said:

If the OP is still around, I'd be curious about his take as a chemist on using other iron sources for striking leather black rather than everyone tediously reacting their own ferric acetate. With the presence of water almost any source of iron will work. Will Ghormley uses a drum of water with rusty strap iron in it. I'm sure that most of us have noticed that blood does the same job too, as do iron filings (e.g. from a splitting machine). Iron diet supplement pills work if ground up and dissolved in water. I tend to use iron sulphate crystals from the garden centre. All you're doing is providing a way for the iron to react with the tannic acid in the leather leftover from the tanning process to form FEO3 (an insoluble blue-black lake). I have scepticisms on the importance or specialness of vinegaroon in achieving this effect, though I admit that the acid left after the reaction may make a difference in the longevity of the leather -- but that in turn presupposes that the leather isn't washed in plain water after striking (which I presume we're all doing after using any striker including vinegaroon, right? ).

Interesting read.... fun learning about Roon from all of you

[RW6mm]

First pic: collection of rust items

second: after 2weeks in 50/50 vinegar-water

 

pic 3: the top and black test piece after a 4 second dip into the try as seen in pic 2

 

pic 3: the bottom test strip was dipped 4 seconds in an ice cream bucket that the rusty items were rinsed off in.

 

i am using coffee filters to strain the tray of pic 2.

 

i am putting the cruddy coffee filters into the ice cream bucket.

To Neutralize:: i will wait as i have in previous posts to apply baking soda just prior to using the Vinegaroon.

time will tell.  I wonder how well the filtered batch will work?

How much water can be added... a pint,? a quart?

Should i have added a quart and Not Strained at all?

 

i m a retired Taxidermist, having hand tanned hundreds of deer capes, i like the hands on leather crafting.

 

ps:  also own a straight stitch walking foot Mini Thompson with Monster Wheel set up.  It sews liner to 5-7 oz ok when the tension is ‘right’.

[Klara]

I forgot about my vinegaroon for a bit over a year and remembered it only last week (the bottle was closed - no idea whether the steel wool is still in there or whether I had taken it out) when I needed watery black dye and found I only had edge paint. The vinegaroon worked beautifully! 

[Doc Reaper]

And what does “striking” mean???? Y’all have to explain to us as though we are a 2 year old!

[Doc Reaper]

On 9/4/2021 at 2:46 PM, chuck123wapati said:

it will be ready on the first full moon of the second month of the third year when the blue wooly tater bug flies south. 

i apply it with a cold beer! but some good home made Irish whiskey will work also.

I tried applying it with tequila, the mixture made the tequila taste funny

[Matt S]

12 hours ago, Doc Reaper said:

And what does “striking” mean???? Y’all have to explain to us as though we are a 2 year old!

It's an industry term for things like vinegaroon, where colour is introduced by a chemical reaction rather than a pigment or dye. The most common is the grey-black-blue one you get from iron. There are others but they aren't as spectacular and use less common ingredients.

Edited February 20, 2023 by Matt S

[Annemiek222]

I made de vinegaroon earlier following a ‘recipe’ that required the steel wool to stay in de the vinegar for quite some time. The solution turned into a brownish slurrie. I put it through a sieve and used it and all items turned black. I bathed the items in some water with backing soda and it all worked nicely. I had some vinagaroon left and stored it. Tried to use it on some new leather items, but it did not do anything anymore. So made some more. Steel wool and vinegar, left it 10-20 hours, tested a drop in leather it turned black, yeay. Prepared some straps to be coloured and dunked them in the solution. It turned grayish, took the straps out and waited. They did turn blackish so okay, happy. Put them in a water bath with some backing soda… stayed blackish, went to bed and the next morning find the straps dried and lost most of the colour…. Is this what the backing soda bath does? Or.. is the vinegaroon not strong enough yet? I really don’t know what to think of it.

On the right a piece of scrap leather. I used that one to test the vinegaroon (you can see black dots on it). I also dunked it halfway (the part with the black dots was submerged in the vinegaroon) and did not rinse it with the backing soda bath.

[Gosut]

It's possible that it wasn't strong enough. Another possibility is the tannins in the leather. On New Year's Day, I used vinegaroon I had made over several days back in the summer, but prior to use I dunked the leather in black tea and let it stay a few minutes to add tannins. Then I dunked it in vinegaroon, then, when it was nice and black (less than half an hour), removed, gave it a baking soda bath, then rinsed and put it back in the tea for a short soak, then rinsed again. Based on comments on the forum, the next time I use vinegaroon, I think I'll not bother with the baking soda. The idea of the baking soda is to remove free acetic acid in the vinegaroon that's left in the leather, but it will also remove any tannins left.

What's going on is that the iron and the vinegar form ferrous acetate, which reacts with tannic acid to produce black. That's why I gave it a short soak in tea before and after. There has to be enough ferrous acetate to react with the tannins, and enough tannins for the ferrous acetate to react with. My guess is that 20 hours didn't produce enough ferrous acetate, but that's just a guess.

[SUP]

@Annemiek222 , ordinary household vinegar is 5% strength. It has a pH of 2.5; iron Acetate which forms when we add iron, the pH would be about 3. Once the leather is dyed, a rinse in plain water should be sufficient to rinse off the vinegaroon and bring up the pH to about 4.5-5 since, water has a neutral pH of around 7. A baking soda wash could raise the pH too much and end up actually making it basic instead of acidic and that could actually damage the leather more.

Making Vinegaroon is a simple matter - old iron pieces in whatever form - old nails, steel wool, whatever - soaked in household vinegar over 2-3 days. I keep mine completely covered and never has it exploded - not sufficient gases to do so. Mine turns brown and sludgy but it does not affect the dyeing - I dip, rinse in running water and allow to dry. Works fine for me.

If your leather turns grey it is either because your vinegaroon is depleted or, as @Gosut says,  the leather needs more tannins. If the latter, a tea soak should work. Only thing is, after the treatment, the leather should be well  rinsed in water  to remove all of the liquids, else this can cause color transfer. Plain leather, without a tea dip will not transfer or leak black liquid because the tannins getting dyed  are bound to the leather, but when we dip leathers in a tea solution and then the vinegaroon, the tannins in the tea liquid that are free on the leather and not actually absorbed, will also react with the vinegaroon, so  you will have a wet piece of leather dripping a black dyed liquid. It needs to be rinsed off. If allowed to dry and the leather gets wet later, it can cause transfer. I have experienced this. So, a plain tap water rinse is sufficient.  

If the leather turns grey because the vinegaroon s depleted, and there are still pieces of iron in the solution, try adding more vinegar. Else try adding a few pieces of iron. It does take a few days. I have never had it be ready in less than a day but others have, so it might work for you. 

It is all a matter of trial and error. Rather like cooking. Like adding a bit of salt here or a smidgen of pepper there.  It is a very simple reaction after all. 

Did you try to dye your leather pieces again after the vinegaroon was kept aside for 2-3 days? It will probably be of a greater strength by then and dye your leather better. 

 

[Annemiek222]

20 minutes ago, SUP said:

@Annemiek222 , ordinary household vinegar is 5% strength. It has a pH of 2.5; iron Acetate which forms when we add iron, the pH would be about 3. Once the leather is dyed, a rinse in plain water should be sufficient to rinse off the vinegaroon and bring up the pH to about 4.5-5 since, water has a neutral pH of around 7. A baking soda wash could raise the pH too much and end up actually making it basic instead of acidic and that could actually damage the leather more.

Making Vinegaroon is a simple matter - old iron pieces in whatever form - old nails, steel wool, whatever - soaked in household vinegar over 2-3 days. I keep mine completely covered and never has it exploded - not sufficient gases to do so. Mine turns brown and sludgy but it does not affect the dyeing - I dip, rinse in running water and allow to dry. Works fine for me.

If your leather turns grey it is either because your vinegaroon is depleted or, as @Gosut says,  the leather needs more tannins. If the latter, a tea soak should work. Only thing is, after the treatment, the leather should be well  rinsed in water  to remove all of the liquids, else this can cause color transfer. Plain leather, without a tea dip will not transfer or leak black liquid because the tannins getting dyed  are bound to the leather, but when we dip leathers in a tea solution and then the vinegaroon, the tannins in the tea liquid that are free on the leather and not actually absorbed, will also react with the vinegaroon, so  you will have a wet piece of leather dripping a black dyed liquid. It needs to be rinsed off. If allowed to dry and the leather gets wet later, it can cause transfer. I have experienced this. So, a plain tap water rinse is sufficient.  

If the leather turns grey because the vinegaroon s depleted, and there are still pieces of iron in the solution, try adding more vinegar. Else try adding a few pieces of iron. It does take a few days. I have never had it be ready in less than a day but others have, so it might work for you. 

It is all a matter of trial and error. Rather like cooking. Like adding a bit of salt here or a smidgen of pepper there.  It is a very simple reaction after all. 

Did you try to dye your leather pieces again after the vinegaroon was kept aside for 2-3 days? It will probably be of a greater strength by then and dye your leather better. 

 

I put some new steel wool in the solution and dipped the leather pieces back in. They turned blackish. Did not expect that, because of the fact that the bath with baking soda made the leather more basic than acidic. But… it is still possible that the black will fade again when dried, I think.

So what is your advice to do next? Leave to dry? Rinse in plain water? Have I damaged the leather?

[SUP]

@Annemiek222 You need to leave the iron in the vinegar for a couple of days before it will dye well. I, at least, need to leave it in for a minimum of 3 days. That is when I get the best color. But others get it sooner. Either way, the iron needs to be in the vinegar for a sufficient amount of time. Did you wash the steel wool with a light soap solution first and rinse thoroughly? . I'm not sure if there is anything on them to keep them from rusting but that could prevent the vinegar getting to the actual iron and delay the forming of Vinegaroon. If not, just take them out again, clean well and put it back in.  I have done it and everything was fine.

Right now, I would suggest you let the leather dry and see what happens. 

I doubt you have damaged the leather. Leather is pretty hardy that way. Once all the dyeing is done, you can condition it to preserve it. I would just not  put it into baking soda. An alkaline pH is not good for leather.

People have been making Vinegaroon for hundreds of years. It is a simple procedure and some trial and error occasionally. Just relax about it. There is always a solution and if all else fails, there is always dye. 

[cowboyjune]

Anyone ever try this with concentrated vinegar? My hardware store sells 30% vinegar, as opposed to the 4-5% standard white vinegar. Guessing it would speed the reaction, but would it be safe to put on leather?