Dying an entire disc

[lilbrummy87]

I have looked around a little and can not find anything on this.

I want to turn a white star plastic disc pink. I see that people like to float a disc in the dye to dye a side of it but I am afraid that if a sink a disc and it touches the bottom it might harm the disc. How would I keep from the disc sinking all the way?

Any help would be great!

 

[shroom]

This should work (basic principle)

Gradient tool

Fill a bucket or something and hang the disc from a paper clip.

 

[zenbot]

It will be fine. I've done it a bunch of times. You just want to heat up the dye so it's steaming and not boiling, turn off the heat, wait 5-10 minutes for the bottom of the pot to cool and you'll be fine.

 

[tallpat]

Chopsticks

One suggestion was to use chopsticks:
http://www.dgcoursereview.com/forums/showthread.php?t=36051&highlight=chopsticks

 

[MartyK]

You can also feel your pan with water and figure out how much water you need for the disc to float and not touch the bottom.
Measure the water cup by cup (or smaller increments if you like) and after adding each cup, put the disc in and see if you can push it down. Once you got enough water to submerge the disc, get rid of the water and put that much dye in.

 

[MartyK]

I saw that you are worried about the disc sinking, I've done a few discs and that has never been an issue. The discs want to float.

 

[koogs]

I've done entire discs or bottoms and never had one burn.

 

[Fishy]

throw a thumb tack in the bottom point side up to keep it from hitting if you are real worried we use similar technique in door shop with nails). or just sink the disc and move it around a bit.. you'll be fine..

 

[lilbrummy87]

Thanks for the help. I plan on trying one or a few of these soon. now I just have to find an older rit dye that works. Seems everywhere around me has the new formula and I don't want to order online due to the small amount I need.

 

['ster]

About dying and masking discs:

Masking:

I use the sign vinyl (as many others do), obtained from a local graphic shop. The first 2 pieces my buddy and I got were free, but when I went in last time, there was a cold, curt lady who wanted to charge me $12 for a square foot. I think when she realized I was going to just leave, she let up a bit and I walked out with a square yard for $5! ha.

Dye Products & Process:

In terms of dye, I've used powder rit, powder & liquid rit (combined), and powder tulip with powder rit. I use hot water (heat on stove, take outside, dump in cheap plastic container - for ease of cleanliness) and pour in some acetone for good measure. As per rit instructions, I add salt, too and stir and dip. I leave them in for anywhere from 15 minutes to 12 hours, depending on the desired darkness.

My primary motivation for dying is two-fold: first, I like to be able to easily find my disc, so anything I have that is not close to pink is a problem for me - thus dye job. Second, I like to personalize my discs so that in the event I lose one (my name and number is on the back), it would be very hard for a finder of my disc to claim "it came that way." So, while I love aesthetics, that is sort a secondary reason for dying.

Because of my motivations, I dye both sides of the disc by fully submerging it into my dye bath. I flip it every 10 minutes or so and move it around a bit. If using vinyl masking on champion/elite z plastics, I need to adhere vinyl to both sides of the disc. For anything more complicated than a triangle, the masking becomes nigh impossible as the vinyl needs to mirror itself on top and bottom - ie, two pieces of vinyl that reflect each other (one is backward from the other) That makes sticking the vinyl onto the disc very difficult because the two pieces must be in the exact same place on either side. to avoid that issue, I have "framed" the top image with the bottom. All of that is unnecessary with star/esp plastic.

Right now, I am testing the dye-remover rit powder in a pan out in my yard. It doesn't seem to be having any effect aside from cleaning the disc fairly well. I had low expectations for this, but wanted to give it a shot before more seriously considering bleach.

I've attached a few pics - a blue FLX buzz my buddy did - he hand cut the vinyl with scissors and knife. there were a few places where he didn't adhere the vinyl well enough and some dye snuck through. The red Nuke was another buddies go at dying (using my vinyl) and he didn't do a good enough job cutting out the shapes and centering them, but the dye job is very nice. (the shiny spots are just water - pic was taken right after I rinsed it) The other one is my go at it, (elite z Surge SS) using vinyl on both sides. I'm holding it to hide my name & number and the crescent near my hand is just shadow. the black specks on the back are just sharpie hearts.