Another bone dye job: Case mini copperlock

Doug Add

Doug Add

Joined
Jan 9, 2012
Messages
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I decided to add some color to this natural bone Case mini copperlock, but it did not turn out as well as the mini copperhead I dyed last month.
 
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Nice work! Another stainless bladed Case gets the dye treatment.

One of these days I'd love to see what happens to a cv Case under similar circumstances. Maybe someone else with a curiosity and a "beater" knife will show us.
 
Thanks for the kind words. No experiment ever turns out perfectly, right? I knew this would become a hard work knife because of the locking blade, so I guess I shouldn't be too disappointed in the dye job result.
 
Wow Doug, this is really looking great! I've been eyeing a copperlock for the longest time, but I just can't pull the trigger for some reason. Yours is a real treasure, I would love to hear more details on your procedure.
 
I learned about the technique from this post by Flying Guillotine. And followed the procedure described here by jamesbeat.

The formula for this one was a moving target. I did some research on the RIT dye webpage and found a mix that was close to what I wanted (Chile Red, #143). I already had two RIT liquid dyes similar to ones in the recipe from the work I did on my mini copperhead, so I substituted sunshine orange and dark brown for the recipe's tangerine and cocoa brown, and purchased a bottle of scarlet.

Saturday evening I experimented with mix proportions, and found one I thought would work. It was:

1/4 teaspoon dark brown
1 teaspoon sunshine orange
3 teaspoons scarlet

When it came time to do the work Sunday afternoon I used the same proportions, but mixed enough to add to the approximately 2 cups of water in the pan. The mix in the pan was:

1 teaspoon dark brown
4 teaspoons sunshine orange
12 teaspoons scarlet

I checked it periodically, by removing the knife from the dye solution, and dipping it into water I had heated to similar temperature. At about 10 minutes in I didn't think it was dark enough, so I added another 1/4 teaspoon of the dark brown.

It was still too orange, so twice (about 10 and 15 minutes later) I added another 3 teaspoons of the scarlet.

After about 35 minutes in the dye I turned off the heat and began the cooling process.

I think I may have left it in a bit too long, or used a too saturated dye mixture, because I am experiencing some dye rub off onto my fingers, which did not happen with my mini copperhead. Or maybe I did not let it simmer long enough in the dye solution after adding the final scarlet addition?

Hope that is helpful.
 
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I love Case's natural bone, so when I saw this I was scarred.

Dude, you rocked it though.
I love what you did and the night and day scales are perfect. :thumbup:
 
That's a killer transformation. Very drastic but it looks great. I've never even thought of dying bone to my own specs until seeing your threads. If I were to try it I might start out slow with a Rough Rider or the like and then try and go after the more expensive blades. Keep up the good work.
 
Thanks, and for an update, the dye rubbing off on my fingers has not recurred since that first day. All is stable now.
 
That really does look awesome. I'm impressed. Better than a lot of Case production dye jobs for sure.
 
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