Can I dye nylon twine into multiple colors?

Name: Ruth

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How to dye yarn and string

Gail Callahan's
Hand Dyeing Yarn and Fleece:
Custom-Color Your Favorite Fibers with Dip-Dyeing, Hand-Painting, Tie-Dyeing, and Other Creative Techniques

Washfast Acid dyes
at Paradise Fibers

Washfast Acid dyes
Also known as Nylomine dyes, excellent for use on nylon. One ounce of dye will dye six pounds of fiber!

Country or region: Louisiana

Message: Can I achieve the multicolors on twine as shown at the Twine By Design blog - the twine labeled "tye dye (de colores)"? Or would it simply be more feasible to order from them?

You can dye twine to a multicolored effect. However, you can't dye it so that each ply is consistently a single color, different from the others. The picture you reference shows one ply that is made of yellow, orange, and pink strands, another that is made of pink, lilac, and teal strands, and a third that is made of green, aqua, and blue strands. What you can do, instead, is combine similar colors in a true variegated effect, in which the same pieces combine different colors. Is this what you want to do?

The Twine by Design twine is solution-dyed, meaning that the color is added to the nylon before it is extruded into the form of a fiber, while it is still liquid. Given that, the color variegation within a strand must be created during the spinning step, when thin fibers are combined to make a thicker string.

In my opinion, while the blending of colors in the Twine by Design "Tye Dye / De Colores" twine is nicely colorful, a truly variegated twine would be more beautiful, with different hues blending gradually from one into the next. To make your own, you would start with white twine, or twine that is as close as possible to white. Since some nylons have coatings that make them impossible to dye, it would be best to try dyeing only a small sample first, to find out whether the twine you are trying to dye is in fact dyeable.

Note that there are twine manufactured with many different materials. A jute twine would be colored with the same kind of dye used for tie-dyeing cotton, and the same methods, but that won't work on nylon twine. It's essential to match the type of dye you use to the fiber content of what you're trying to dye.

To dye nylon, you should use a type of dye called acid dye. There are many different types of acid dye, but all will work on any dyeable nylon, as well as on animal fibers such as wool. It is also possible to dye nylon with a different class of dye called disperse dye, but it's more difficult and the colors are less wash-resistant. A third way to color nylon is to use a type of fabric paint called pigment dye, which can be more convenient to use, but it produces colors that are not quite as intense, and that wear off more quickly if the dyed material is given a lot of use.

Some acid dyes, such as the leveling acid dyes found in all-purpose dye mixtures such as Rit dye, are better at smoothing out and producing a solid color, while others are better at bonding permanently to the fiber and not moving around. For a multi-colored rainbow effect, you want the latter type of acid dye. A good choice for nylon is the WashFast Acid Dye line, which is also known as the Nylomine Dyes; another good choice, more expensive, would be the Lanaset dyes. These dyes are usually not available in local stores, but you can purchase them by mail-order. (See Sources for Dyeing Supplies Around the World.) In the US, you can purchase WashFast Acid dyes from the dye supply company PRO Chemical & Dye, which is located in Massachusetts, as well as from another company called Paradise Fibers.

To use the WashFast Acid Dyes to color nylon in multiple colors, you would use ProChem's recipe, "Direct Application on Nylon using WashFast Acid Dyes". [PDF] Other ingredients called for include a detergent named Synthrapol, soda ash, ammonium sulfate, a mixture called PRO Print Mix F, and the water softener they call Metaphos. All of these items can also be ordered from PRO Chemical & Dye. Before dyeing, the twine should be skeined loosely, as described in my April 12, 2008 blog entry, entitled "How to dye silk ribbon to be variegated in color". The dye should be painted onto the prewashed nylon twine in long stripes of color, and allowed to dry, after which it must be set with moist heat, using steam, following the instructions given in the recipe.

I recommend that you undertake this project only if you would like a truly variegated twine, or one which looks more tie-dyed than the Twine by Design "Tye Dye / De Colores" multi-colored solution-dyed nylon twine. If the Twine by Design twine is exactly what you want, then I recommend that you order it from them, instead. Given the amount of trouble that would be involved in dyeing the twine, it's worth dyeing it yourself only if you want to get a more unique hand-dyed product with more beautiful variegation, or if you want a different color scheme than is currently available.

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Posted: Tuesday - March 01, 2011 at 07:55 AM

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Can I dye nylon twine into multiple colors?

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