Stabilizing Wood - Setting up and testing - Cactus Juice and Ultraseal

Let me add something to my comment above. The wood guys selling plain and stabilized woods buy in big pieces and cut them to small sizes. This takes tools and time. They offer more variety than the average guy could ever get his hands on with out breaking the bank. We have not done it at my business to date for a reason. It's better for me to buy it from the wood guys already cut and stabilized and I am pretty sure I go through more wood than most reading this. To be fair, I am now at a point where it makes sense to start buying big pieces and processing them in house. Tooling will cost me around $4 grand and it will take moving a lot of wood to cover that. I don't expect to ever have it all in house. I just don't have access to the supply chain the full time wood guys have. I will always buy from them for resale.

Buying burl or other wood in a small size just to treat yourself will cost a fortune. These guys are not getting rich selling fancy blocks of wood. The waste in cutting this stuff is mind numbing. The economics of treating your own wood should really be considered before someone jumps into it. You can buy a lot of wood for a couple grand in tools, chemicals, etc. Probably more than you could make knives for in a life time. Even if you set yourself up to treat a bunch of wood, what do you do with it? Sell it is the answer of course but that isn't as easy as you might think it is either.
 
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I just made up my mind, I'm done stabilizing. I'll buy what I need. Actually I don't see me needing anymore wood in this lifetime. I just got another seven pounds of blocks back from stabilizing a short while ago. I had good luck stabilizing for a while, then for some reason I couldn't stop my setup from losing a vacuum when I shut off my pump. I tried everything I could think off, changed out a ton of fittings, lines, changed the chamber I was using, etc, with no luck.
 
T
I sent down some wood for you to try out........... Be careful with those paint pots. The lids have been known to come off and fly across the shop.....

Larry
 
BossDog said:
Let me add something to my comment above. The wood guys selling plain and stabilized woods buy in big pieces and cut them to small sizes. This takes tools and time. They offer more variety than the average guy could ever get his hands on with out breaking the bank. We have not done it at my business to date for a reason. It's better for me to buy it from the wood guys already cut and stabilized and I am pretty sure I go through more wood than most reading this. To be fair, I am now at a point where it makes sense to start buying big pieces and processing them in house. Tooling will cost me around $4 grand and it will take moving a lot of wood to cover that. I don't expect to ever have it all in house. I just don't have access to the supply chain the full time wood guys have. I will always buy from them for resale.

Buying burl or other wood in a small size just to treat yourself will cost a fortune. These guys are not getting rich selling fancy blocks of wood. The waste in cutting this stuff is mind numbing. The economics of treating your own wood should really be considered before someone jumps into it. You can buy a lot of wood for a couple grand in tools, chemicals, etc. Probably more than you could make knives for in a life time. Even if you set yourself up to treat a bunch of wood, what do you do with it? Sell it is the answer of course but that isn't as easy as you might think it is either.
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I completely concur with you as far as the prohibitive cost and other issues of home stabilizing.
There are those times when I think that it would be great to do a small amount of some eye catching wood at home, Then reality rears it's ugly head and all the points you have mentioned pop back into mind.
I'll just send it out! Is my moment of clarity.

Another big point for me is running my sharpening & retail cutlery store with just a plastic strip curtain dividing the retail front part from the knife making & sharpening work area of the store.

Just cutting, grinding, sanding and finishing my stabilized wood knife handles and all the steel dust make's a huge mess for me to stay on top of and the knife shop part has no windows or doors to open. I rely on the vent/Air Cond, system and my few under matched vacuum's at each station.

Laurence

www.rhinoknives.com
 
update:
Today after 18 hours, more or less under some vacuum, I pulled out a stag scale from the leather dye (spirit based and not oil based as I had originally posted) and cut it in half. I could see that the dye penetrated the scale entirely. The problem is instead of brown, it dyed the interior a light pea green. I put it back in and will leave it for a couple days and check it again.

Also I have ordered in some oil based leather dye and will try that.


Who has died bone and how did you do it?
 
BossDog said:
update:
Today after 18 hours, more or less under some vacuum, I pulled out a stag scale from the leather dye (spirit based and not oil based as I had originally posted) and cut it in half. I could see that the dye penetrated the scale entirely. The problem is instead of brown, it dyed the interior a light pea green. I put it back in and will leave it for a couple days and check it again.

Also I have ordered in some oil based leather dye and will try that.

Who has died bone and how did you do it?
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I used potassium permanganate, and it looks purple when you mix it with water, but it turns the horn dark brown.... Probably some caution to be taken with that stuff too. -Larry
 
BossDog said:
update:
Today after 18 hours, more or less under some vacuum, I pulled out a stag scale from the leather dye (spirit based and not oil based as I had originally posted) and cut it in half. I could see that the dye penetrated the scale entirely. The problem is instead of brown, it dyed the interior a light pea green. I put it back in and will leave it for a couple days and check it again.

Also I have ordered in some oil based leather dye and will try that.


Who has died bone and how did you do it?
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Tracy,
Except for some shoe polish staining. I haven't done any bone dye work myself. what comes to mind is the Giraffe bone folks in S. Africa. Perhaps you have dealt with some of these folks for stuff for the supply biz?
They do a multitude of colors and it would be worth a few calls to Cape Town or?? Being that far away they may be more likely to help?

Laurence

www.rhinoknives.com/
 
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I have a 9" vacuum unit that I use for investing when casting metal. I would like to try stabilizing some wood, but don't want to buy a bunch of supplies until I know if I can do the stabilization. Anyone know where I can buy small quantities of chemicals? ...Teddy
 
goldsmithy said:
I have a 9" vacuum unit that I use for investing when casting metal. I would like to try stabilizing some wood, but don't want to buy a bunch of supplies until I know if I can do the stabilization. Anyone know where I can buy small quantities of chemicals? ...Teddy
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Cactus juice in quarts at www.turntex.com is the smallest quantity I have found of MMA
 
Meridian Blades said:
I used potassium permanganate, and it looks purple when you mix it with water, but it turns the horn dark brown.... Probably some caution to be taken with that stuff too. -Larry
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I have used it. Im sure you know this Larry but for some new guys that don't....potassium permanganate is a strong oxidizer that will actually burn the outside of antler. All, and I mean all, dark brown or reddish brown antler that has come out of India or Pakistan has been treated with potassium permanganate. This is a health export requirement. The stag antler would be a washed out white color similar to north American antler like deer or elk if not treated. It is a really strong chemical. Be careful.

PP will only dye the exterior, I am looking for a method to dye all the way through bone.
 
I did some more testing this weekend..

I grabbed some bone, stag and wood for a comparison test.

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I mixed some aniline green dye into a jar of denatured alcohol and a jar of Cactus Juice...
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I am not sure when I discovered my gloves were leaking. This stuff stains deep. After washing it with everything I could find, it still didn't come off. I look like I voted in an Iraqi election..
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This stag was in leather dye for a week under vacuum. It looks promising on the outside...blotchy on the inside..more time is probably not going to help much...I think it will need some heat...

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Here is my mad chemist set up about half way through Saturday..
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the Fiebings spirit based leather dye didn't work. I am now trying the Oil based leather dye...I expect the same results but I need to try it.
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I ordered some antler dye from Van Dykes, a taxidermy supply place. I got this..
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Spin the can a bit and it shows this..dang it..I have this on the shelf..

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Here are the spirit based leather dye stag samples... They are blotchy and have a weird green tint to where some of the dye has penetrated..
I am calling this a bust..
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The aniline dye in alcohol did a decent job with the wood in penetrating. Vacuum was a couple of hours.
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I mixed some Ultraseal with blue dye. After 12 hours, the dye did penetrate but it was blotchy and unacceptable...You can see where some pockets of the dye pooled in the bone.
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This shows more time in vacuum is needed. I had this in for 3 hours...
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2 convection ovens and 3 pressure pots..I am trying to not blow the place up..
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a peek inside the 5 gallon pot. 5 test jars with different kinds of goop and color..
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Really nice color of blue from dyed Ultraseal under vacuum for 2 hours..

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2 hours apparently isn't enough. we have some harder spots in this soft pecan that didn't take up much, if any dye.
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so...I stick in some green dyed ultraseal for 12 hours under vacuum and heated it again.. This came out well I think..
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a rough sanding shows some of the spalted lines and clearly some blue and some green areas...maybe you wouldn't use this piece on a knife but it shows potential for the process. A short vacuum on one color, harden it, a much longer vacuum with another color. I should have done a 3rd color but I didn't have any mixed up.
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these are stabilized with a little black dye. I just wanted to see the MMA penetration. Its hard to see but I am satisfied the MMA penetrated completely and these are stabilized..
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These are the ribs I threw in the smoker this morning before heading out. I made a mistake in the recipe and put in two tablespoons of cayenne pepper instead of 2 teaspoons. They were HOT! You can see my dogs feet in the picture. He was waiting for me to drop something so he could grab it. His name is Rocky Raccoon but he is really a Black Lab..
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I had some stag and bone in vacuum for 12 hours in both blue (ultraseal) and green (cactus juice) for 12 hours. Both showed nearly identical penetration.
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In this fuzzy picture, cutting them open showed the same results. Blotchy penetration. Straight vacuum, at least for 12 hours isn't going to dye stag or bone through evenly...
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Can you heat the vacuum chamber slightly? I wonder if a little warmth would open the stag up a bit? Very interesting stuff
 
BossDog,
Once when talking with a guy in the back room of K & G were they do the stabilizing. He said that they can be in the chamber for up to a month! We were discussing the wood I had sent them, so I have a feeling you need to let it soak in there quite a bit longer to get the penetration you are after with the Dye and stabilizer.

Take it for what it's worth.

Laurence

www.rhinoknives.com/
 
Dang good info Boss!

I'll be watching USAKM for the "Box'O Random Dyed & Stabilized Stuff". LOL
 
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