Making Sand Red Elements

[evancelt]

This week I've spent some time making sand red elements for a future MOC.

I started with tan elements and then submerged them in a mixture of tiedye dyes, acetone, and warm water.

As you can see in this first batch it took some time and experimenting to find a color match --v. The 4x4 curved round plate is an original LEGO sand red piece. The 1x1 plates on the left were the formulation I eventually ended up with - a mix of grays and pinks to make a desaturated fuschia.

The second batch used that first color match formulation and was much closer! Added some SNOT bricks, tiles, cheese slopes, arches, etc

As long as the pieces only sit in the bath a short time they don't dissolve and the dye takes (they still connect together tightly and LEGO logo hasn't dissolved off studs)

Only downside was during the first batch I dyed my right hand red haha. (The dye solution ate through my rubber gloves, so I triple bagged rubber gloves the next time)

Some nasty acetone fumes, too, so I set up a negative pressure vacuum in my house using our whole house fan and had it continually bring in fresh air

Anyway, thought I'd share the experiment 

[Jack Sassy]

This is very interesting, I have never heard, nor thought of dyeing LEGO bricks. From the looks of it, this experiment was a success (not taking into account a new colour for yer hand ). Quite curious how far one could take such an experiment, this opens a new world of possibility. 

 

Anyway, thank ye for sharing results with us! 

[Autumn]

Now the economy is going to be flooded with fake sand red bricks!

That's actually really cool. I have known about dying bricks before but it's usually dying white or trans clear bricks. Now I'm wondering how to make sand purple.

[Yperio_Bricks]

The result looks fantastic! Can't wait to see the parts in one of your mocs!

Btw, is that a tiny glass of Bonne Maman marmelade in the first picture?

[Mylenium]

Silicone gloves probably would help. ;-) Otherwise I'm not sure what to think of the whole thing. Those bricks are probably not going to age gracefully and the process would no doubt be difficult to replicate to get exact colors every time. It's still cool on some level, though.

Mylenium

[evancelt]

On 8/6/2024 at 4:56 PM, Yperio_Bricks said:

Btw, is that a tiny glass of Bonne Maman marmelade in the first picture?

Haha yes

21 hours ago, Mylenium said:

the process would no doubt be difficult to replicate to get exact colors every time.

Yes, hard to get consistent colors for sure. Check out the variety of sand reds here:

 

[jtooker]

Thanks for sharing your process!

[Toastie]

On 8/8/2024 at 6:06 AM, evancelt said:

Check out the variety of sand reds here

It looks beautiful! I don't think Nature has only one sand red color at hand as well

I also like to see the aging process - the result must be beautiful as well! That is the same with white (and some other colors) taking on some patina and looking ... mature.

Very nice method!

Best,
Thorsten

[MAB]

Do you find the bricks are dull compared to undyed ones? I dyed lots of bricks black with RIT dye about 10 years ago and they were all very dull. They haven't faded but are still dull. 

[evancelt]

1 hour ago, MAB said:

Do you find the bricks are dull compared to undyed ones? I dyed lots of bricks black with RIT dye about 10 years ago and they were all very dull. They haven't faded but are still dull. 

To be honest, regular official sand red pieces are kind of dull / low-luster. The dyed ones that started with tan are sometimes *more* shiny 

[dr_spock]

Avast, it appears you got caught red handed altering LEGO parts.  How long before the dye wear off the skin?   The variance in shades adds character.

[Grover]

Do you have a blog where you share your recipe?  The temperature, time for dying, concentrations, and the dyes used all make a large difference, plus if you did any prep work (soaking in a surfactant or solvent first etc.).  I'm curious because this process really looks good, much more so than I would have anticipated, and I would be curious to try it and play around.  I'd also probably get some ABS from the hardware store, dye it, then cut it in half and see how far the dye penetrated.  This is very interesting!

Also, if you don't want the solution to go through your gloves, get a box of disposable nitrile gloves.  Normal latex and natural rubber are useless against organic solvents.

Edited August 12, 2024 by Grover

[evancelt]

8 hours ago, Grover said:

Do you have a blog where you share your recipe?  The temperature, time for dying, concentrations, and the dyes used all make a large difference, plus if you did any prep work (soaking in a surfactant or solvent first etc.).  I'm curious because this process really looks good, much more so than I would have anticipated, and I would be curious to try it and play around.  I'd also probably get some ABS from the hardware store, dye it, then cut it in half and see how far the dye penetrated.  This is very interesting!

Also, if you don't want the solution to go through your gloves, get a box of disposable nitrile gloves.  Normal latex and natural rubber are useless against organic solvents.

Hi! No blog post going into the recipe unfortunately. Doing it more scientifically would be great! In general, the recipe was 2:1 ratio of hot water (hottest from tap, so ~130F) : 100% acetone, plus equal parts of light gray and pink DyeMore Rit dye. The times unfortunately ranged depending on part type and I assume the temperature of the water (took longer as the water cooled off). In general, though, times varied from ~2 minutes on the lighter end to 30 minutes on the darker end.

On 8/10/2024 at 9:19 PM, dr_spock said:

Avast, it appears you got caught red handed altering LEGO parts.  How long before the dye wear off the skin?   The variance in shades adds character.

The dye wore off (or rather my skin layers wore off!) within a day or so :)

[Yoggington]

On 8/8/2024 at 5:06 AM, evancelt said:

Haha yes

Yes, hard to get consistent colors for sure. Check out the variety of sand reds here:

 

I low-key love the inconsistency. Looks perfectly weathered.

[Grover]

15 hours ago, evancelt said:

Hi! No blog post going into the recipe unfortunately. Doing it more scientifically would be great! In general, the recipe was 2:1 ratio of hot water (hottest from tap, so ~130F) : 100% acetone, plus equal parts of light gray and pink DyeMore Rit dye. The times unfortunately ranged depending on part type and I assume the temperature of the water (took longer as the water cooled off). In general, though, times varied from ~2 minutes on the lighter end to 30 minutes on the darker end.

Thanks!  OK, I'm going to see if I can get some of this dye. I'm thinking thermostating the solution with a sous vide will keep a constant temp, then putting a timer on it, with something like a deep fryer basket so the batch can be lifted out and immediately quenched in cold water in another bucket.... I will look around and see what I can find. I will post results here.

[MAB]

On 8/12/2024 at 6:22 AM, Grover said:

I'd also probably get some ABS from the hardware store, dye it, then cut it in half and see how far the dye penetrated.  This is very interesting!

Almost certainly surface only, otherwise pieces would have warped if they had become porous enough to let the dye penetrate any further.