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Water-based vs. Alcohol-based Aniline Dyes

stubhead

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Any opinions on this? I have used water-based to this point. Supposedly the water ones are more light-fast, but the big fellows like Gibson, PRS etc. use alcohol-based. It seems kind of minor, but I've got an LMII order going in and I'm considering adventure. :guitaristgif:
 
I have used the alcohol-based aniline dyes on a number of occasions.
Personally I like them, and in my experience find they they offer a "truer" color, or at least one that is more predictable.

Blue's especially.  I think CB called this phenomenon dichroic separation.
Whatever it's called, if you are looking for a light blue on maple for example, the MEK gave me teal and the aniline gave me blue.
Can't help you with a comparison to water based though, it seems more suited to applying directly to the wood.

I guess another advantage of the alcohol based is that you can mix it in lacquer to make a tinted lacquer, for example if you were doing a burst.

 
I dont think the dichroic separation on blue is due to water vs alcohol vs mek vs acetone based.  I always thought it was the dye itself, not the carrier.  However, thinking on it... maybe there's something to that.  What I found, made me think along these lines was some plain paper towel dipped into the dye.  What was at first blue, soon became teal, yellow and brown on the paper towel.  Most of it was teal, going to a yellowish teal, and then a sharp ring of brown at the edge of area where the dye stopped - maybe because the carrier finally evaporated.  This was all due to something like capillary action, with the dye being drawn through the fibres of the paper towel, just like the fibers of the wood.  I'm not sure if I re-wetted the towel, with acetone or mek, that the crawling of the dye would continue, and it would eventually separate into a true yellow vs the brown that was left behind.

Again, I thought that this was due to the type of dye, not the carrier.  But seeing as "maybe" the way capillary action, evaporation, etc comes into play, it might be made better or worse with some carriers than others.  I used Mohawk blue "Ultra Penetrating Dye", and I thought it was an Azo based dye, but I'm not sure anymore.  I'm sure it wasn't an aniline based dye.

From what I've seen - Warmoth has had its own similar situation with blue in the past.  There was a time when the blue tops were fairly green looking, especially evident on blue bursts that were sort of tealish in the middle and then transparent blue on the bursted edges.

Blue, it seems, has been a real pain in the rumpskee.
 
Hmm, interesting.

I have had cases where I have applied a MEK tinted lacquer solution (when applied too thick) where the color (dye) just seems to have separated in the mixture.
When it dried, it created an uneven tint.  Some spots darker, some spots lighter.  A picture would really help here, but you can recognize it.
Sort of like that paper towel example though as well.
The obvious solution is just to not apply the mixture too thick, but the point is that an aniline tinted mixture doesn't seem to behave that way.
They seem to just "work" a little differently.
Interesting science behind it.
 
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