I'm having trouble with dyeing plush. What can you recommend to dye this kind of fabric?

Name: Mayra

—ADVERTISEMENT—

Dye polyester and poly/cotton blends

Country or region: Brazil - SP

Message: Hello, I am a fursuiter here in Brazil and I'm having trouble with dyeing plush. What can you recommend to dye this kind of fabric?

Currently I use airbrush and acrylic ink, but it comes off, with time.

What is the fiber content of the plush? This is the real key to the problem. If you can find a real dye that will work on your fiber content, then the results will be better and longer-lasting than acrylic-based inks, but you must find the right type of dye for the fiber, and some dyes can be difficult to obtain locally in the small quantities that you need.

Cotton velour is particularly easy to dye, as are silk/rayon velvets. The best dye for cotton is a fiber reactive dye, such as Procion, Remazol, or Drimarene dye, but even an all-purpose dye will work, if you don't launder the dyed fabric too many times, and, when you do launder it, use only cool water, by hand.

If you can find some nylon fleece, if it is not coated with a surface finish, then it will be very easy for you to dye. The best kind of dye for nylon is called acid dye, because it is used by heating the fabric and dye in water to which a mild acid, such as distilled white vinegar, has been added. Although it is a synthetic fiber, nylon is dyed using the same dyes and methods as wool. Since all-purpose dye contains an acid dye, it, too, works pretty well on nylon, though it's not the best. Antron nylon fleece has been very popular for use in making puppets, and it dyes very well, if you get the right kind of dye and use the correct recipe, but apparently its manufacture has been discontinued.

Unfortunately, synthetic furs are made from fibers that are much more difficult to dye than natural-fiber velvets and velours. The dyes that work well on cotton, silk, and wool all fail completely when applied to polyester or acrylic. The best dye for synthetic furs is a special kind of dye called disperse dye, which was developed for use on synthetic fibers. It works for polyester, nylon, acetate, acrylic, and modacrylic. It cannot be applied in cool water; polyester, acrylic, and modacrylic must be heated to boiling (100°C), with the dye, for an extended time, at least half an hour, while nylon and acetate should be heated to 85°C, or at least 50°C for paler shades. (See, for example, the forum post, "tests with iDye Poly".) Before you even try to buy this dye, test a small swatch of your plush fabric to see whether it can tolerate being boiled. Its texture may change significantly.

The most difficult thing for you about disperse dye will be finding a source to buy it. If you do a web search for disperse dye, narrowed by your location, you may find contacts for buying large industrial quantities of disperse dye. The quantities involved are far larger than would be practical. While some dye manufacturers will sell buckets containing as little as one pound of dye powder for each color, it's more common to see a minimum order of 5 kilograms. Try contacting Dystar Brazil, which has an office in São Paulo; their minimum order size is probably an immense 5 kilograms per color, but perhaps they can refer you to a company to whom they sell dye, who might be able to sell smaller quantities to you.

Small crafts and art supply shops may sell dyes in small quantities, but it is rare to find any that carry disperse dye. Look for Jacquard iDye Poly; if you find a local shop that sells any dye or paint made by Jacquard Products, ask them if they can order iDye Poly for you. (Don't let them order plain iDye, without the Poly in the name, because, while iDye Poly is disperse dye for synthetic fibers, plain iDye is a direct dye for natural fibers only.)

Another form of disperse dye that may be easier to find is a disperse dye crayon. These are sold in crafts stores or sewing supply stores as "Fabric transfer crayons". They are used by coloring heavily onto paper, then ironing the design onto your fabric. The results of ironing onto fur are difficult to predict, but it may be worth a try.

If you cannot find disperse dye anywhere in your area, and if you cannot find a mail-order source within your country, then you will have to consider buying it internationally. Shipping costs can be very high, but sometimes, if you use the telephone to order, you can request a slower economy form of shipping that will costs much less. I do not know what limitations Brazil may place on the importation of art supplies, nor what customs fees they may charge. I would recommend that you order disperse dye from PRO Chemical & Dye or Aljo Mfg in the US, both of which have much lower prices for dyes than most small-quantity dye retailers, or perhaps Kraftkolour in Australia. (See my page, "Sources for Dyeing Supplies Around the World", for contact information for these and other suppliers.)

There is another type of dye that does work on acrylic fibers, and in fact produces more intense colors on acrylic than disperse dye does. This dye is called basic dye, or cationic dye, because the dye molecule bears a positive electrical charge, and it includes the very first synthetic dyes that were invented. I usually recommend against the use of basic dye, because it is more dangerous to the user's health than many types of dye, and it is hard to work with because it stains everything you get it on, unlike the other dyes. In addition, it is more difficult to obtain than the safer disperse dyes. However, basic dyes are widely used in industry to dye acrylic clothing; if you have any acrylic socks, for example, which are not white, then they were dyed with basic dye. You can order modified basic dye, suitable for use on acrylic, from Aljo Mfg in the US; Aljo sells it for use as a silk paint, in their "alcohol/water dyes".

If you can't obtain disperse dye, or if your fabric will not tolerate boiling water, then your best solution may be the airbrushed acrylic paint that you are already using, in spite of your problems with its wearing off. Note that some acrylic paints should not be diluted much; if they are diluted with too much water, then they will not bind well to the underlying material, and will wear off much more quickly. Jacquard Products fabric paints, for example, which are based on an acrylic binder, must be diluted with no more than 25% water, by volume, for airbrushing. It's possible that you could get longer-lasting results from a different brand of acrylic paint than the one that you are currently using, or by diluting it less, if doing so does not make it too thick to use in the airbrush.

(Please help support this web site. Thank you.)

Posted: Friday - June 10, 2011 at 10:37 AM

Follow this blog on twitter here.
Tweet

getBlogName(); > getCategoryName("<$EntryCategoryFolder$>"); >

I'm having trouble with dyeing plush. What can you recommend to dye this kind of fabric?

> >