Tinting Liquid Diamonds

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jttheclockman

jttheclockman

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Those that use Liquid Diamonds epoxy resin for casting what dyes do you use?? I am looking to make a black blank as deep of a black as I can make. My questions are what dyes, what ratio if any, will the dye separate and settle to the bottom before the blank cures?? I will be using a pressure pot for this. Will adding dye to the mix will this upset the 2 to 1 ratio of the resin mix?? Any other tidbits of do's and don'ts you can provide will help. Thanks.

Now I do have US Composites carbon black dye and also have Composites Envision dyes. If that helps.

By the way yes I need to cast the blank and can not use a premade blank.
 
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An alcohol-based or alcohol-soluble dye is what you want to use as it won't settle during curing. I have used a few colors of the Trans Tint concentrated dyes with LD epoxy, works for me. I have not used it but looks like the US Composites carbon black dye should work.
 
I have used Mixol liquid colorant with several other epoxies. Some colors slow the cure a bit, but have always got a hard surface with heat or post cure. A very deep opaque black and much better than the powdered pigments in my opinion.
 
I have used both Mixol and Alumilite dyes for tinting LD. I have had good results and have cast some black that I tinted with about 12 drops of Alumilites black dye which came out great.
 
Can't help with the dyes but I can add ... I know your used to working with Silmar, with LD, double or triple the cure time. It takes a day to set up, then it stays flexible for a day, then it starts to harden. Also, don't spill any in your tank. I had a vertical tube leak and it glued my vertical tubes to the rack and the rack to the tank. Had to cut the tank in half to free the blanks and rack. Not a good day. The only good thing was it added something different to my demo presentation. Lol. Good luck!
 
bmachin said:
John,

Don't know what the odds of this working are, but System Three has this:

https://www.systemthree.com/blogs/epoxy-files/83510596-epoxy-paste-pigments

Bill
Click to expand...

Thanks Bill. I bought those some time ago but thought they were for only epoxy glues. That is what I use them for and boy the black on that stuff, one tiny bit makes black super black. I will have those for ever if they do not dry out. Just used some yesterday.


JohnU said:
Can't help with the dyes but I can add ... I know your used to working with Silmar, with LD, double or triple the cure time. It takes a day to set up, then it stays flexible for a day, then it starts to harden. Also, don't spill any in your tank. I had a vertical tube leak and it glued my vertical tubes to the rack and the rack to the tank. Had to cut the tank in half to free the blanks and rack. Not a good day. The only good thing was it added something different to my demo presentation. Lol. Good luck!
Click to expand...

John I have only cast 2 pens with LD and the second one was a test cast for a blank I want to try. It did come out well and that stuff sure is clear. I did allow actually 4 days before I spun it. It is funny you mention the spill. Last night I cast a couple silmar blanks and have to say being I have not cast or done any pens in a year I forgot all those little steps that we pick up but never mention sure do creep in when you get back into it. I always warmed silmar up before adding hardener. So I took my 3 ounces and put them in the toaster oven and turned it on for 10 minutes. The thing is never do this. First warm the oven and then put the resin in after it cycled a couple times. Why you ask. Because it melted the plastic cup because the heat is not regulated till it gets warm. It is just wide open. Talk about clean up. Lucky no hardener in it so it was all resin. But the lightbulb came on and yes warm the oven first dummy. Then I redo that and go to put the blanks in the pressure pot feeling proud again. Started compressor and put air in tank and watching the guage and went to 60 lbs and started thinking I never go this high I always use 45. Fumble to stop the compressor when all I had to do was turn the handle on the valve. Knocked the devil out of it. Shut the compressor down and now I want to look if i did damage to the blanks. Well something must have happened to one of them and when cast and I looked this morning one side looked like it exploded. Never seen that and not sure what happened but again lesson relearned. But getting all the kinks out again and will be a well oiled machine again in about a month or two.:biggrin::biggrin:

Seems like many options. I may just run a test blank tomorrow and see what happens before I go for the gold on the good blank. I will watch for settling and see how it mixes. Another learning curve. I only use LD for things I need good sticking power. Otherwise Silmar is my go to resin. Thanks everyone.
 
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