Hey guys Ron here, I don't know who that dork Cameron is that seems to be all over the Internet
But today I'm gonna show you how to dye some plastic now
Typically, I would just spray-paint this stuff, but we're working on a pretty dandy cr250 here
So this time around I'm gonna do it right now in order to get this project started
We're gonna need a pan or pot that the parts will fit in some acetone
And this is the dye. It is called RIT dime or gonna be doing black on these parts and the parts
I'll be doing are the radiator guards front sprocket cover your brake line guide and just for the heck of it
I'm gonna try to do the shock bumper. This is like made of dense rubber. Not sure if it'll accept the dye
But if it does, that'll be cool because I absolutely hate that yellow color
Oh and one thing I forgot to mention we're gonna need a stovetop oven as well
Ideally, you should have this in a shop environment
So it's ventilated properly since we'll be using acetone, but I guess you could get away with doing it in the house as well
I just don't tell your significant other now
We're gonna need to clean this stuff up with Dawn dish soap or degreaser before we get to dyeing
So now we're gonna mix the dye the acetone and water
Here in this pan, and we're gonna do this at room temperature
So it doesn't react if you have hot water and you add an acetone
They'll react and could possibly burn you so we're gonna mix it at a 12% ratio for the dye
So if you're using one cup of water use about an eighth cup of dye
And then the acetone is going to be at a 5% ratio
So some of you guys might be wondering why are we using acetone for dyeing?
Well, it opens up the pores in the plastic and helps the plastic absorb the dye better
So you kind of have to play with the ratio of the acetone if your plastic is not accepting the dye very well
you're gonna have to use more acetone and
If the acetone or if the plastic is being melted or deformed in the dye
You're gonna have to use less acetone. So we've got 12 cups of water in the pan
So that means we're going to use one and a half cups of dye
Now with the dye added in there we're at 13 and a half cups of fluid
So 5% of that would be five and a half ounces of acetone
Think about a little too much acetone got a whole freakin gallon here
You know what? Probably a good idea to wear some gloves to this project get this stuff on your hands
It's gonna stain it pretty good
Now with the pan on the stove
We're gonna get this solution up to 200 degrees and then we'll be ready to start dipping some parts in
So like I said earlier
You're gonna want to exhaust out these fumes since we're using acetone
So get a fan going open up the doors and I would recommend wearing a respirator as well
Looks like this stuff's getting ready to boil. So I'm going to check the temperature on it
182 so close enough to 200. Let's go ahead and drop a part in there and see what it does
So let's go ahead and see what these parts will look like after 15 minutes of soaking
Looks pretty black to me
Okay, there's a little bit of white still showing through
Right up on top there
So I am gonna have to add a little bit more acetone to this mixture sprockie guard looks pretty similar as well
The black is pretty spotty and some that gray still showing through take a look at the shock bumper. Ooh
That one looks pretty black
Sweet, I think we might have some luck with that one
So I'm gonna add about 2 ounces of acetone at a time
But like I explained earlier you do not want to add it to a warm solution
So I'm gonna have to let that cool off for a bit before I add that extra acetone
I apologize for the noise in the background got the exhaust fan going
So if it's kind of fuzzy that's why so while that solution is cooling down, but I take a little closer. Look at these parts
Sprocket cover accepted the dye pretty evenly just not quite as black as I would have hoped but guide is a little bit spotty
Pretty much a gray color now and one thing that just occurred to me
I think this sprocket cover will look a lot better without this little extra portion here
So I'm going to trim that off right at this line here
That looks so much better just use a little hacksaw and then
120 grit sandpaper and finish it off with 320 grit pretty pumped. All right, so I pulled the shock bumper out of the solution
I would say that thing absorbed it pretty much perfect. So this bumper is just an extra one
I had laying around to test so I'm going to take a little scalpel here and see if I can scrape off any of that
Dye
Pretty impressive stuff that dive won't even scrape off and then when I pinch it or like flex it won't flake off either
So yeah, pretty pretty surprised how well it holds up now. I just need to get these pieces dialed in
All right, guys, we got some results pretty pumped with how the stuff came out
Some of the pieces are a little bit flatter in color. We're actually a little bit purplish like this mud flap
Just stole that off of Hailey's XR 80 over here. Also did the chain guide as well?
But these pieces for the most part look pretty good
I would say the shock bumpers turned out the best of all does a really solid black but
For these pieces that turned out a little bit flatter that don't have much shine to them. Got an idea for you guys
And so what we're going to be using is called
Seracote trim coat got to make sure this stuff is completely cooled down and dry then we're going to wipe it down with this
ceramic coating
Here's the results of a trim coat pretty pumped on how this stuff came out
Definitely brightened up and shine that color up pretty good. So that trim coats gonna add a layer of protection as well
So ya can't go wrong
Got the radiator guard all finished up and man this thing turned out sweet a couple things
I learned throughout this process is the bigger parts or some plastic in particular
You're gonna have to use a little bit more acetone and a little bit more. Dye as well as more time
So this guard took about an hour to completely die. You can see it turned out pretty dang black. I haven't done any
Trim coat on it yet might put some of that on top just to shine it up a little bit, but overall really
Stoked with how this one came out
So I would recommend buying about
Three of these bottles if you're going to be doing radiator guards
If you're gonna be doing something smaller like a shock bumper
You'll just need one and then as far as acetone mixture this one took about a 10% acetone mixture
so definitely do not be afraid to add some more acetone and
more dye if you're not getting the results that you want and also one more thing if
You're gonna be doing trim coat on top of this stuff
You got to leave the part out in the Sun to completely dry out
It's gonna have a little bit of water left over from the dyeing process
So you got to have that thing completely dried out before you put that trim coat on
Alright time to see if this dye is actually gonna hold up to the conditions
It'll see on the bike so over here. It's kind of inconspicuous when it's on the bike. So I'm gonna try
scraping this stuff off
See if that'll do anything
Looks like that held up remarkably. Well, it's more just scratching the plastic and not really removing any other color so next
I'm gonna try gas and acetone first up is acetone
Doesn't touch it at all and now we've got some gas I doubt this will touch it either
Yeah, same result they'll holding up really good
and the last thing I'm gonna do is bend the plastic just make sure it hasn't lost any flexibility and
to see if that dye will flake off still looks like
Just how it was before so
Yeah, pretty dang impressed with this. Dye
It looks like it's gonna hold up extremely well on the bike one last idea for you guys that are struggling to get a good
Dye on your parts is to leave the part overnight in the dye
So this one I left overnight just in the cold. Dye
You can see it's a bit darker than the other side which was only died for about an hour. So
Yeah, it made a pretty good difference there
I'm actually tempted to dye this one a little bit more the other side turned out really really good
I'm gonna get this stuff on the bike and check it out
All right, so now we're to source the supplies for this project I found the dye at a local hardware
- same with the pan the acetone. I got at Home Depot. You really only need a quart size
You don't need a whole freaking gallon like I bought here
I will also drop a link down below to where you can find the seracote trimco stuff
I am so frickin amped how this stuff turned out
You definitely do not need to go buy new plastics
If you're only changing the color and one more thing for you guys
If you did not see the last video I posted on the new 8 series electron carb that I have right here
Definitely go ahead over the channel and check that out. I'm actually giving away one of these carburetors to one of you guys
So if you want to find out how to enter that giveaway go watch that video over on the channel
Alright, that is gonna wrap up this video
Thank you so much for watching guys
And hopefully you can go ahead and apply these same techniques to do your own plastic dying at home. Just like we did here
I'm gonna go and shave off this
magnificent thing so I can get back to being Cameron and I will see you guys in a future video one last thing before I
Go the day after I post this video which will be July 27th
I will be at the Washougal pro National down in Portland, Oregon
So if any of you guys are headed out there to watch the race you see me. Come say what's up
Hope to see a lot of you guys out there later
You