Powder or Sky blue dyes.

[Honest John]

I have been requested to make a pen for my son in law whom wishes to give it as a birthday gift to his work colleague. Stay with me it gets more interesting! His work chum is a Manchester City fan and the request is to somehow theme the pen for a Coty supporter. It seems City’s colours are light powdery blue and white. The sky blue sort of colour is the thing that’s troubling me. My suggestion that could he not encourage his mate to support United (red and white, and doable), was not well received. Apparently this fan support thing doesn’t work like that it seems. Now I have a number of excellent Chestnut spirit dyes, including a blue one, but from memory is much darker than the powdery colou I want. I also have a small bottle of White that comes in the Chestnut trial kit that presumably I could add to my royal blue to achieve a powder blue colour? Not sure how a White spirit stain works, but I imagine it must be more like a paint. Similar to a water colour gouache. If I can achieve the right colour in a mixing container, how deep could I expect the dyes to penetrate wooden slats or veneers?i am imagining that I would like to fabricate a pen blank from thin pieces of blue and white wood, and I would like the blue pieces to be blue all the way through so to speak. I shall of course experiment, but I just thought somebody might have more information than I have on the penetration of dyes into timber.

 

[Phil Pascoe]

Buy a blank the right colour?

 

[CHJ]

What result do you get if you dilute the Chestnut Light Blue with the White, the white is intended for this purpose.

 

[Terry Smart]

Would this save you any time?? I'd be happy to look through our stock to find the one with the most light blue...

Alternatively...

The Royal Blue Spirit Stain is probably too dark to use as a starting point, for the colour you want you'd be much better off with the standard Blue - which probably isn't far from where you want to be in the first place.
You can use the White to lighten the colour - to 'pastelise' it if you wish. Add the Blue to the White as it will mix better than way (thanks to Stewart Furini for that tip).

The stains will penetrate up to 3mm, but this requires the timber to be soaked in them for about three weeks (time needed will depend on the timber). You could probably get it to go in further if you had the patience.

The White stain is quite thick and doesn't soak in quite as well (nature of the beast, it's the only way to make a White stain) so be aware of that when using it.

Does that help?

Terry

 

[CHJ]

I think the amount of penetration you get will be determined by the wood choice.

I have in the past (many years ago) dyed wood for models using Dylon Fabric dyes. If you intend to segment the pen in strips you could try Dylon China Blue to see if you get full penitration.

 

[Honest John]

Thanks to all for your replies . Chas, that Dylan colour does indeed look to be what I’m after. I was intending to laminate this blank from strips 2 - 4 mm, and I was think8ng of cutting some maple or sycamore or s9metging light coloured like that. Just thinking now, perhaps Ash might be good as the softer parts should I imagine take up the dye well. I love the Chestnut spirit dyes, but I did not realise until seeing Terrys reply that there is a lighter blue than the one I have. That also looks very much like what I’m after, especially if I can mix a little of the white product with it. I guess I’m off to Axminster Warrington tomorrow, not sure how much time I’ve got so I need to get some wood soaking in dye right away. I realise that this would have been perhaps simpler to buy an Acrylic blank of the right colours, but turning Acrylic just doesn’t appeal to me. Thanks again all.