Wood Dye - Aniline Dye 5 Color Kit - Wood Stain Powder

Practical instructions are a bit vague with this product, but the product itself is very good. If you want to know how to get certain colors, search for a video on color mixing with watercolors. That should help, then you just have to work out the proportions. Bought this for a custom sofa build using red oak. The fabric is indigo velvet and the legs, arm and back supports are brushed aluminum. I like oak - it's durable and has nice grain, but I didn't want the natural oak color - it just doesn't go with the fabric or the metal well. I had originally designed the sofa to use purpleheart, but it is very hard to work and expensive. Also, purpleheart fades over time to a brown. Too many problems, so I opted to dye the oak. I didn't want the wood to stand out so much as blend in. I mixed up 1/8 tsp black, 1/4 tsp blue, 1/4 tsp red in several tablespoons of alcohol then topped up with warm tap water to make roughly 1 quart of dye in a 5 cup plastic food storage box with tight lid. I put several coats of dye on all pieces and left them overnight to dry. It was too red and not dark enough. I've painted for years, so color mixing is something I'm pretty good at. I added an additional 1/2 tsp of the blue powder after warming in the microwave for 1.5 minutes. Got a lovely black/blue/purple Once lacquered, it will look really nice with the brushed aluminum and dark blue velvet. Very happy with the results. I wanted almost a black purple. Looks great! It highlights the grain very well, too.Use a small scrap piece to test the final finish. Dye it at the same time and then test the finish coat on the scrap BEFORE you put any finish on the real pieces.. This will keep you from making a really big mistake if you don't like the actual finished color. You don't want to have to wait for the finish to dry and then sand it all off again so you can start over - huge time waster and extremely annoying. Colors always change drastically once the final finish coats are applied. They will be darker and richer - usually. The dry wood looks a bit dayglo, but once the lacquer goes on, it becomes rich and deep. The dry wood will not give you a real clue what the finished wood will look like. I used a scrap stick and after the first dye session lacquered it only to find it was far too red. So, back to the dye a second time.I found the dye very forgiving. I had accidentally left some small drips on the wood the first time around, but when I applied the second round of dye, the drips vanished completely. I think this was largely due to it being oak. If it had been a softer wood it would most probably have soaked in enough to be a problem. You have to be really careful of drips and fingerprints with any dye or stain. I applied it with a brand new cellulose sponge cut in half and rinsed out with tap water. It worked very well. I had finish sanded with 150 grit paper as per the instructions. If you sand too smooth, the dye won't penetrate well. I think a brush would be very messy. Cut several pieces and have them on hand. If you drop one, you will not want to reuse it unless your garage is far cleaner than mine. This type of dye is powerful and long lasting. I've been told it will stay on you for weeks if you really let it sink in. In my case, I'd look like a blue cartoon character - not desirable really.... You want to wear gloves and protective clothes. Don't wear anything you don't want stained. Be careful mixing the dye as well. It can and will stain your countertops and possibly your floor really well... If you use rags to work it in, don't wash them with your clothes! (No I didn't do this, but back in my younger painting days, such things happened.) It is very thin when mixed, so it will splash really spectacularly if you get too busy with the mixing spoon or when applying to the wood. I didn't wipe the dye off. I worked it in with the sponge until it was all soaked in, but I wanted really dark wood color. I just made sure it was even and not pooling anywhere. Very nice product. Good bright colors. Easy to use. I'm using Deft gloss lacquer after the dye has fully dried. Going for a Japanese lacquer look... High finish and super smooth. Lacquer is the best for this, though a bit more work. Good product. It works. Staining wood is definitely a process. Give yourself enough time to do it or you will regret it. Otherwise, have fun with it! Some friends shook their heads when I said purple wood, but now they say it looks great. Hey, it's my sofa - it can be purple if I want it to be purple. Your sofa or guitar or whatever can be any color you want... Beware of backseat designers on any project. It is your vision. Stick to your guns on it or you will end up with something you didn't really want. A hard learned lesson I am passing on for free... Hope this helps...

This dye kit is fun to mess with. The dye powder does not dissolve very well in 94% isopropyl, so definitely do as others have suggested and dissolve the powder in hot water first, then mix with isopropyl alcohol and apply to wood. I was able to closely match the stain color of my kitchen cabinets to add some panels to cover our range hood exhaust fan. I tried a couple traditional stains and conditioners that just did not work. Decided to try dye and it worked great. I won't be wasting any more money on traditional wood stains.

I had never used a dye on wood before and liked the selection of colors in this pack, the ease of mixing, the ability to mix colors and mixing with water. I’m only offering this review as a caution to those who may be putting their project outside. As stated, I used water to mix the dyes and I used the colors on wood planters and covered all with a UV protective spray sealer. That was about 3 months ago. We have had over 100 temps for many days since and these are sitting in direct sun. The yellow and green colors have faded away, almost 100% fade. I do not attribute this to a product fail, I simply used the product as I did in the past with oil based stain and it did not last in direct sun. I will try again on smaller projects that are in more shaded areas with alcohol base and marine/UV coating. Indoors I have no doubt the colors would stay vibrant. Live and learn, overall I’m happy with the product :-)

Vibrant colors & a deep contrast you can't attain with traditional wood stains. Almost idiot-proof application. Worth every penny.

Great product for the wood finisher. You can mix and match the colors for touchup and blending, which is what I use it for.

This product is great - I'm a novice woodworker and my current project is an aquarium stand I'm cladding in 1/4" stain grade maple plywood. I want to stain it the same color as the deep wine red cherry cabinets I have in my kitchen (you know, that color you see on Queen Anne furniture). I tried several water based and oil based stains on test pieces, but they all had issues - a pain to apply, long wait times to multiple coats, streaks, covered up the wood grain, etc. The closest I got was with a Rustoleum Black Cherry, but it streaked really badly during application. So, I tried these Keda dyes...they worked beautifully - really brought out the wood grain, SO easy to apply, quick dry time to apply several coats, no streaking, etc. My only wish is that they had some sort of a color chart because I had to try several mixes and carefully note the proportions of dye to water before I got what I was looking for (for the record - on my maple plywood, the perfect mix was 1/8 tsp Red dye, 1/8 tsp Black dye, and 1/16 tsp Brown dye in 6oz of water, three coats of 90 seconds letting the dye sit on the wood, then wipe it off and wait 30 minutes to do the next coat).And the cleanup is so easy too - no mess, and just a few seconds of running water and I was able to reuse my foam brush and even my nitrile gloves (unlike that oil based mess).I can't recommend this product enough, and I'm getting another batch (because quite frankly I used up a lot of it trying different mixes - for the record, they're not kidding about "be sparing with the blue dye, it tends to take over").Some advice: on the piece you're going to use this stuff, on, sand it with 80 grit (if it's that rough), then 120 grit, and finally 180 grit, make sure you wipe the surface dry of dust, then flood it with water for 90 seconds and wipe the excess water off and let it sit to raise the grain, sand it at 180 again and wipe the dust off, THEN apply the dye - great results. And make sure you use warm water when mixing the dye up. Tempted to try alcohol instead of water (cut your dry times to a third), but I'm just so happy with what I've got with the water now, I think I'll stick with it. I was going to try the General Finishes premixed dye and/or the TransTint's, but I was worried about how much money I'd have to spend to get the ones I was guessing I'd need to mix to get that dark cherry color - this entire package was <$13.