Dyeing Ventile???

[Buckshot]

Is it possible to dye ventile successfully?
I'm thinking of making a camo jacket - but my own camo
If so, I suppose I'd start with a light base material - say yellow and then add darker colours onto that.
Could you paint a stripe with a brush of brown say and then, when dry put a green one next to it?

Just thinking...

Cheers

Mark

 

[Toddy]

The answer is, *not easily*.
Unless you are using commercially produced reactive dyes, which are expensive, then cotton needs to be tannined, mordanted, re-tannined and then dyed.
Two good companies I'd recommend for dyes are;
Kemtex and Fibrecrafts. Both will sell suitable dyes and Kemtex in particular will give you relevant advice on suitability of particular dyes. Fibrecrafts sell a good range of dyes, and have an excellent catalogue with many clear instructions.
http://www.kemtex.co.uk/
http://www.fibre-dev.co.uk/index.asp

What you want to do isn't impossible, but it needs a lot of preparation, expense and patience

Cheers,
Toddy

 

[Buckshot]

Hmm, so basically for us mortals it's a 'no' then.
Thanks for the info Mary - much appreciated.

Mark

 

[Toddy]

No I'm sure you could *do* it, but it's the assortment of colours that could be a problem.
Give it a bit of thought; exactly what do you want to dye? A length of cloth can be pretty straightforward, but you have to tenter (stretch it out and pin it to a frame) first. Once it's there then you can paint on any colour you want.
If you start with yellow fabric then almost any green and brown will give you good colour on it, and they will mix to create tones too. If you add a rusty red dye or a blue into the mix you will get and entirely different set of colours. Most camouflage has black in it too, though the dark brown and red will give you a suitable 'tone'.
So, three or four dyes, a tenter frame and pins. Certainly a good start.
Preparing the fabric first can be as simple as a thorough wash and extra rinse, dependant on the dyes you use.
Fixing the dye afterwards again is dependant on the dye. Most fix with heat, microwaves or a hot iron, read the destructions
I'd love to see what you come up with, I keep threatening to do a tie dyed camouflage hootchi from native plant dyes.....but that really does need preparation

Cheers,
Toddy

 

[Buckshot]

I'd like to have 2 jackets, one of which is camo. Perhaps something like the old para camo of WW2 (I know you can buy them ready made but at £250 each it's a bit out of my 'whim' pocket)
If the fabric needs to be pinned, can it be done with the completed article? I thought it would be better to cam up after sewing than before to get the colour to flow...
Sounds like it is achievable then...
I'm looking into prices atm and someone to do the sewing for me - we don't have a machine !
Would I be talking of 4 metres for a jacket do you think?

Thanks

Mark

 

[Toddy]

Make life easy for yourself, buy a pattern. Failing that, make one in cheap 120" wide polycotton and just running stitch it together. In fact if you're using ventile, which is expensive, I'd do a polycotton toile anyway. Onced you are happy with the fit, undo the tacking stitches and use the toile as your pattern. Pin out the fabric and then draw the pattern onto the cloth. Now you can paint/dye as you choose and you can see where the pieces will join too. Still feasible and nowhere near as awkward as trying to pattern dye a finished jacket.

Cheers,
Toddy

 

[led]

(This is rrapidly becoming Toddy's sewing workshop - sorry! ) What thread would your recommend for sewing ventile?

 

[Toddy]

No worries, it's distracting me from sewing arming hoods

Thread? The commercially made jackets are sewn with a polycotton thread, I believe. If you can find a mercerized cotton thread that works well in your sewing machine's tensioning set up, that would be best I think. Certainly if you intend to dye the jacket then the thread would be best made of the same fibres.
The real pain with ventile is that it is woven so tightly that it's difficult to get the needle through; so, use a new needle, and when it starts to 'chug' change it for another one. It's not your machine, it's not the tension gone nuts, just change the needle

Cheers,
Toddy

 

[Buckshot]

Mary,

Going back to dyeing, why is it best to peg the cloth and stretch it out?
Is it so the cloth doesn't scruntch up when applying the colour or so the dye takes evenly?

Cheers

Mark

 

[spamel]

How about making the jacket, put it on and then get kids to squirt water pistols full of different couloured dyes at you?!!

Could be fun, I volunteer to be one of the kids!

 

[Toddy]

He'd look like a shower curtain

Ventile is so tightly woven that it's hard to dye it successfully at home anyway. However, since you want camouflage then even-ness of the dye isn't so important. The difference between a well applied dye and a bad one is that the first looks 'right' the second looks like you made a mess with last night's regurgitated curry....it's a 'stain' not a dye. By tentering the fabric you're giving the dyestuff a fighting chance of actually working. The kind of dyeing you're after isn't immersion dyeing, but applied dye; and if you don't want to go to the extra emb*ggerance of batiking it to create cells that the dye won't leech out from, then your best bet is to stretch it out taut, and not only see what you're doing but let the dye into the fibres. Ventile will naturally try to keep the dye liquid out, so that has to be overcome first too. The whole thing will need to be evenly soaked.

I wonder if fabric marker pens might work well on the ventile the ones for cotton Tshirts are certainly cheap enough, and you could buy a lot of packets for the price of the dyes....might be worth a try.....and an iron is used to set them, and ventile will take the ironing no bother.

Is this any help? or am I just unnecessarily making things awkward for you?

Cheers,
Toddy

 

[Buckshot]

It's a great help Mary. Thanks very much, your knowledge of fabrics is constantly astounding :You_Rock_
I understand now. You stretch it to allow enough room for the liquid dye to get in and around the fibres.
I'm thinking perhaps this might be a project too far at the moment...

Very interesting all the same though.

Mary