Country: UK

Message: Would these instructions apply to dyeing an item which is 100% acrylic? Is Jacquard iDye Poly a suitable product for dyeing acrylic? What do you mean by a 'dye carrier' which you mention in the answer which you gave to the FAQ? I want to dye an item which is white and 100% acrylic black.

As you already know, you cannot dye acrylic with most dyes. The dyes that work on cotton, silk, or wool will just wash out of acrylic. There are two types of dye that do work on acrylic, one being disperse dye, such as iDye Poly, and the other an entirely different kind of dye,  known as basic or cationic dye. See "Dyeing Acrylic".

The safest way to dye acrylic is to boil it with the polyester dye which is called disperse dye or transfer dye. This is the method I recommend for dyeing acrylic. iDye Poly should be suitable for this purpose. Unfortunately, like all disperse dyes on acrylic, it will yield only pale to medium shades, depending on the amount of dye. That means that black is not an option. Would a lighter color, such as medium grey, or something more colorful, do for your project?

The dye carrier chemical is important with high-energy disperse dyes for dyeing polyester to full color intensity, but it is neither needed nor helpful for dyeing acrylic. There are significant chemical differences between acrylic and polyester. The iDye Poly dyes appear to be a low-energy disperse dye that does not require the carrier chemical even for polyester.

Acrylic can also be dyed with another type of dye, called basic dye. This dye gets the name from its positive charge; all basic dyes are cationic dyes. (All other types of dye are either negative in charge, or neutral, depending on the type of dye.) The good thing about basic dye is that you can use it to dye acrylic black. However, there are, unfortunately, many bad things about basic dye. Basic dyes are more of a pain to use than other dyes. 

You absolutely must buy a large and expensive cooking pot to devote to the purpose of dyeing, because no cooking pot that is used with basic dyes should ever be reused for food preparation. You can't dye acrylic at room temperature, so a cooking pot is required. The pot must be large enough for your garment to move around in freely; depending on the size of your item, this may require a five-gallon pot (20 liters). Furthermore, since the dye must be applied with vinegar or another acid, you must avoid materials that will react with vinegar; don't get a cheap aluminum pot. You must have either a stainless-steel pot or an enamel-covered pot, to use as your dyeing pot for dyeing acrylic. For outdoor use, you will need a propane burner or electric hot-plate to provide heat for the dyebath.

Basic dyes are inappropriate for use in a home kitchen. In some cases, the dyes themselves are known carcinogens; that is, an inappropriate exposure to them now will sometimes cause a case of cancer many years later. This is not true for the much safer dyes we use for cotton or polyester. Basic dyes can be used safely in a well-appointed laboratory with every safety precaution. If you must use basic dyes at home, use them out-of-doors, in an area where children do not play.  You must not get any of the dye on your skin; wear heavier gloves, more reliable than the thing disposable latex or nitrile gloves we use with less dangerous dyes. It's important not to spill basic dyes in your kitchen for two reasons: one is their long-term toxicity, and the other is the fact that they stain everything they touch. Most other dyes easily wash off of any surface, such as plastic, but basic dyes stick to almost everything. Another extremely important precaution is to avoid breathing any of the dust from the dye, when you open the jar and measure out the amount you need, to dissolve in water. Dry dye powder can be caught by the slightest draft and fly around the room. It's best to measure out the dye in a box that has holes cut for your gloved hands, and a plastic window at the top so you can see what you're doing; this helps prevent the lightweight dye powder from flying across the room. It is important to wear a well-fitted dust mask (one that does not allow you to get any air in around the edges) when working with the dry dye powder, as well as eye protection such as safety glasses, and clothing protection such as a lab coat which you do not wear into your home.

Neither disperse dyes nor basic dyes can be purchased in local shops. You will have to go to a dye supplier, or mail-order your dyes. In the UK, where you are, you can buy disperse dyes from Kemtex Educational Supplies, Fibrecrafts, and Rainbow Silks, as well as some other dye suppliers, but none of these companies appear to carry basic dyes. In fact, I do not know of any UK source for small hand-dyer quantities of basic dyes. Town End Colors for Industry has information on how to use basic dyes, but they sell only to industry, in huge quantities, not to hand dyers. You may be able to find the basic dyes methylene blue or malachite green from industries other than dye suppliers, such as medical or chemical suppliers, or perhaps suppliers for aquariums (these dyes are sometimes used as drugs for tropical fish), but they won't have a good black basic dye mixture. If it's worth the cost and inconvenience to you, you can order basic dyes from the US, from Aljo Mfg. in New York, or from Australia, where Batik Oetoro sells basic dyes under the brand name Sandocryl; for contact information and links, see my page, "Sources for Dyeing Supplies Around the World".

A third option is to use fabric paints, instead of true dyes, in a process called pigment dyeing. You will never be able to get a perfectly smooth, even, solid color, but you can get some interesting results, especially if you decide to use multiple colors. Fibrecrafts in the UK sells Jacquard Products' thin fabric paint Dye-Na-Flow, a fabric paint that is made to mimic a dye, which, unlike some fabric paints, does stick to synthetic fibers, and they carry it in both large and small jar sizes.

In conclusion, I suggest that you either choose a lighter color than black, so that you can dye your acrylic with safer, easier-to-get disperse dyes, or choose an item of a more easily dyeable fiber, such as cotton, viscose rayon, nylon, silk, or wool, to dye.

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