Help please ~ dyeing bone and antler

Chui

Chui

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Jul 10, 2012
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There are some great modifications I have seen on here and I would very much like to do some of my own.

Are there certain materials other than the obvious strong tea + coffee that some of you use.

And, are there certain methods you use to carry this out.........then how do you polish and protect.

Any help, or pointing me in the right direction would be greatly appreciated.
 
Purchase a Remington RH30, had sat in the sunlight for a good spell and sun-bleached its color to an almost white, being interested in the same subject mentioned on restoring it back to its natural color, researched what was the proper way to get the color to match using the same process possibly as Remington had in 1930's, turns out that they used a three stage process using dyes that are no longer available being an acid dye process involving a heating of the bone process as well and using a darker stain for the hollows of the jigging giving the Remington Bone that distinctive caramel brown coloring - said one way was using a peroxide etch for cleaning prior but not to let it soak too long follow by the warming of the bone with a heat gun, warming the bone helps the bone take the dye better - anyways plan on keeping the Remington the way found, and call it my democratic Remington - in memorial to the famous Scagel story on his car ride home -
 
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SteveC said:
Potassium permanganate for antler and bone
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Someone sent me some of that stuff to try out saying it was for darkening the bark, was informed to apply it to only those areas to be darkened and that it was also highly toxic - use gloves - it's a powder substance that turns purple when mixed in water - appeared to restore the richness in color to the areas it was intended too - wasn't aware it was used as the same way, just as a dye in general - noted
 
evergreensSequoiaseucalyptusandOaks said:
Someone sent me some of that stuff to try out saying it was for darkening the bark, was informed to apply it to only those areas to be darkened and that it was also highly toxic - use gloves - it's a powder substance that turns purple when mixed in water - appeared to restore the richness in color to the areas it was intended too - wasn't aware it was used as the same way, just as a dye in general - noted
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See here on antler.

Horsewright

Post in thread 'Horsewright Knives and Leather'

GB940Rookie said:
Hi Dave.
Yes, to celebrate the right to carry a Bowie or any other large blade in public. Also including auto knives and the like.
There was a celebration of the Bowie knife, and Jim Bowie, at the Alamo in San Antonio where my wife and I attended. Wore it the entire weekend. I received many compliments on the rig you made for me.
Still do.
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Good deal glad that rig is working out for ya well!


So that hunter and skinner combo is coming along. First two on the left.

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The hamon on the skinner while not quite...
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screened porch said:
Leather dye. I have Angelus, but I doubt there's much difference between brands. Daub it on, let it sit a bit, rub it off.
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I second this. I've had really good results soaking the handles in this dye for a few days to get really deep, vibrant color saturation. Then a heavy rinse in rubbing alcohol. It's pretty messy, takes a while but the results are good.

This dye is alcohol based so it won't affect the steel.

I would shy away from anything involving heat. I've heard of broken back springs from that.

This thread is a great resource:


Travman

Thread 'Custom Dyed GEC’s by Nathan & Travis'

I’m so happy with the dye job on these two GEC’s. I have always loved deep red dyed bone on a pocket knife. However, many red bone GEC’s tend to lean towards pink. I have tried dyeing knives in the past, but was always discouraged by the corrosive action of dyes like RIT. These two knives were dyed by my Bro-in-law. He uses an industrial lacquer based dye that is non-corrosive and does an excellent job of penetrating deeply and not leaching out. I’m excited because I have often turned down red GEC’s because of the white to pink edges around the bolsters. We should be able to fix that issue...
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Different species antler also has variations. Sambar stag is popular because it has good texture, good hardness, absorbs dye well, and takes torching well for Burnt Stag. So it's really the best for any situation. European stag is nice as well. American elk seems to take color fairly well.

You don't see many people use whitetail or muledeer antler (unless left natural). I don't know for certain, but likely there is a reason you never see it dyed any colors.
 
evergreensSequoiaseucalyptusandOaks said:
Someone sent me some of that stuff to try out saying it was for darkening the bark, was informed to apply it to only those areas to be darkened and that it was also highly toxic - use gloves - it's a powder substance that turns purple when mixed in water - appeared to restore the richness in color to the areas it was intended too - wasn't aware it was used as the same way, just as a dye in general - noted
Click to expand...
Years ago bone and stag (cow bone from South America, sambar stag from India) was shipped to processing plants in barrels full of potassium permanganate. It was used as a disinfectant, the darkening of the stag and bone was incidental.
 
Leather dye,heat knife in oven for 5 minutes, take out and apply dye to bone only and put in oven at 250 for about 10 minutes and let air dry untill next day
 
I used hot Rit Dye heated in a small saucepan on the stove, with a couple of Case knives, to good effect. After my experiments, I would only do it with stainless steel knives. It caused pitting on the CV knives I tried it on. I bought the liquid Rit dyes at the local Walgreen's drug store, and mixed the colors to achieve the desired results.

This was the result of one of my efforts. Before and after:
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Yes, that is the same knife. I accidentally ordered two of those, and dyed the more egregiously circus-colored of the two. "Sunset Winterbottom Bone" which looked nothing like the catalog pics. I think the resultant "Chestnut Winterbottom Bone" looks much better.
 
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