I dyed my tuners

painterbob

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I have a Kala KA-S soprano that I like but the faux plastic mother of pearl tuners were pretty ugly. So I used a trick i've used before to color plastic or vinyl. I got some Rit fabric dye, wine color. I took off the tuners and sanded the surface of the ugly buttons to give them some tooth for the dye to stick to. Then I soaked them in the Rit dye.

Pretty easy. I like them better now. They still have that fake mother of pearl look but at least not that milky grey white. I could of just bought some new tuners but I wanted to try this out.

-Bob

dyedpeg3.jpgdyedpeg2.jpgdyedpeg1.jpg
 
I have also heard of people doing this with either coffee or tea.
 
Great idea. Do you have to seal them or anything? How about trying it on the saddle?
 
They look great. Good tip!
 
No, you don't need to seal them. They're stained into the plastic. I guess you could put some clear Polycrylic or something but it would make them glossy. You could do it on a saddle but you'd have to be really careful sanding it to get a tooth for the dye. You don't want to mess up your saddle height or string surface etc.
 
Looks good. I do this to get a mineral or marble effect with a solution of mahogany powder stain, coffee grounds, and alcohol. Heat the solution up a little bit (the pores will open up in the plastic with some heat), let the buttons sit in it for a few hours, then take em out and wipe them down. Cool effect..
 
nice job, painterbob. I like the looks of them, but I like the effect that Tudorp gets with his too. Tony, can you provide a link to the thread where you posted pics of yours or can you just post some more pics?
 
relictuners.jpg
These were done with solution I mentioned above..
 
Thanks! I'm collecting ideas for my Gecko project...
 
Painter Bob, those look great! I can see using that method to antique some bright white replacement buttons I got for tuning machine repair on older instruments. Tudorp , that marbling effect is great too. I am more for the solid color look, but I can see how that may work out better on some instruments.

Awesome ideas all,
Dan
 
Painter Bob, those look great! I can see using that method to antique some bright white replacement buttons I got for tuning machine repair on older instruments. Tudorp , that marbling effect is great too. I am more for the solid color look, but I can see how that may work out better on some instruments.

Awesome ideas all,
Dan

Yeah, mine looks good on vintage or vintage style ukes. Maybe not so much on a new shiny modern style tho.. For that, I would rather go with the solid color like Bob did..
 
Yea. I think it would work well to yellow some white buttons. White ones would give you a better starting point than the mother of pearl also. Always have to go lighter to darker but if you get an ugly color you can always re-dye to dark brown or black.
 
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