I'm going to finish my pure dye assignment with the silk yarn first, but still want to do the same with 10/2 tencel and 10/2 bamboo if I have time.  What preparation do I need to do with these fibers?  Do they need a scour?  If so, with soda ash and synthrapol, or just synthrapol?

thanks,

Linda

 

Comments

Wed, 07/06/2011 - 23:09

Karren K. Brito

Tencel and bamboo are both rayon.  Rayons are made by dissolving some cellulose in a solvent and then extruding them. This process is in itself a purification process and so rayons are usually ready for dyeing.  A washing to remove dirt from handling with a detergent that leaves no residue is the most that you can need. 

Dye one washed and one unwashed skeinin Boring Beige formula I gave you and see if there is any difference.  If there is no difference skip the pre-wash.

Wed, 07/06/2011 - 23:25

dancingfish (not verified)

Interesting!  I didn't know these were extruded fibers.  I'll see what happens with the test.

So would these two fibers be compatible enough that I could dye them in the same bath?

Linda

 

Thu, 07/07/2011 - 16:26

Karren K. Brito

They are made by different processes.  Tencel is an environmental sound fabric, it is has a closed loop system and all of the solvents used to dissolve the cellulose are recovered and reused.  The other rayons are quite polluting because of the solvents escaping into the air, water.  Cupra-rayon is no longer made in this country because it is too polluting.  There is one rayon that won't dye, can't remember which, will look it up, and micro-fiber rayon that dyes unbelievely easily-large surface area.

Thu, 07/07/2011 - 17:25

dancingfish (not verified)

I'll do a test for this too.  Separate jars for each, plus one combined and see if they turn out differently.

Linda

Thu, 07/14/2011 - 02:51

dancingfish (not verified)

First, here is the substrate:

Here are the dye chips:

I tested washed and unwashed, and also dyeing alone and with bamboo.  I don't detect a lot of difference between the washed and unwashed, but the leveling on the single skein may be better than the others, albeit not perfect.  I think the reason it may be better was that I had the dual skeins in a suboptimal jar size for agitation.  (Though for bamboo, my leveling issue around the ties was with the single skein)  I think I need to work more on agitation, or on dissolving the salt when it gets added.  The substrate seems very clean to me, much better than the silk.  It's also white (bleached) rather than natural.  I'll post the bamboo chips when I get them done tomorrow.

Linda

 

Thu, 07/14/2011 - 05:24

Karren K. Brito

Did you double the volume of water when you added two skeins?

The trick here is to get all parts of the skein in close contact with the dyebath without tangling the skein.  A tangled or clumped skein, is not only a pain to deal with after dyeing, it also has compact parts that prevent intimate contact with the dyebath. Look at the trouble we are having with clumped rayon chenille.   I have found that an up and down, kinda plunging motion works well for me. You can actually see the strands in the skein open up and the dyebath rush through.  I like a zip tie or tyvek braclet as sort of a handle for the plunging.

Mary, any words of advice on agitation of skeins?

Thu, 07/14/2011 - 11:19

Mary Rios (not verified)

I plunge, not swirl. I swirled the jar with the fiber once, burned myself, and ended up with a tangled mess.

I had to switch from the wristband to ziptie because this process vs the acid process is much more heated and longer heated and i couldn't keep the band from falling off and the gum from the band would grab the fiber - i like the zip tie ultimately because they stick out and can offer a firm plunge - i have to keep a my system in the bath very careful, because i can't rely on the zip tie for my numbering system!  the silk has proven to me the easiest to plunge to evenness. 

Thu, 07/14/2011 - 19:13

dancingfish (not verified)

Yes, I did double the volume of water for the bath when I added two skeins.  Then I hadn't anticipated the volume with the skeins might overflow my pint jars, so I had to scramble and transfer to two quart jars before I added the dye.  But I had trouble agitating in the larger jar because I had to reach way into the jar to grab the handles.  I was thinking that it might work to use a 30:1 liquor ratio when doing two skeins together and keep it in a pint jar.

I have been using a chopstick to agitate (poking to loosen areas, then moving it quickly back and forth, in several spots around the skein each time), with a little plunging.  I think I should be doing more plunging instead.  For plunging, maybe more bath volume is better than less.

Linda

Thu, 07/14/2011 - 19:26

dancingfish (not verified)

I had erroneously used 20g/L salt and 6g/L soda ash for the boring beige dye baths instead of 30g/L and 8g/L.  Could this (maybe especially the salt) have contributed to leveling issues?

thanks,

Linda

Thu, 07/14/2011 - 19:43

Anne Vincent

I am using fabric instead of skeins, but I have a set of inexpensive long stainless steel tongs I bought at the hardware store I use to pick them up out of the large mouth quart size mason jars.