DYMONDWOOD Search

[Fumbler]

I am looking for suppliers of any Dymondwood in Aus (preferably Sydney). I do believe the original factory in the US burnt down and are not rebuilding. If anyone knows of any stock available in Aus that would be great.
Thanks
Richard

[turnerted]

Richard
I searched everywhere for this stuff some time ago with no success .I will be interested to see if anyone comes up witht a source,
Ted

[Fumbler]

Ted, I am working on something at the moment. if its a success i'll let you know (but maybe not as spectacular as this stuff. I have contacted a shop in India, but unfortunately, its US$350 a sheet CIF not on that, its 36" X 20" x 2". Colour can be chosen, but they do have a selection similar to the pen blanks below. I have found 1 supplier of something similar, but no point sending you on wild goose chase first. I will let you know of both successes or failures hopefully the former.

[hughie]

Strikes me somebody could make their own, it doesnt look impossible. There are many different methods available to produce amazing pen blanks.


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=J5nOS5QQFBs


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=K32LHZcoIIE

[Pat]

The main difference between the Indian/PSI coloured ply and Dymonwood is Dymonwood is produced under pressure, ie the leaves are glued and then pressed until the glue is dry. Dymonwood is rock hard and will take an edge of a freshly honed gouge in seconds, if you are not careful, where as the Indian/PSI stuff delaminates on the lathe

[Ubernoob]

I had never seen that stuff before and it looks pretty cool.

As above I'd think you could make something similar at home, surely some hoop pine, solvent proof dye, some epoxy resin and a bunch of clamps would get the same effect? I'd think epoxy resin would work pretty well as it would fully penetrate the veneer so it shouldn't delaminate on the lathe, but I am a long way from being an expert so feel free to tell me if I'm wrong.

[Fumbler]

I already have Laminated together 2 sheets of 9mm marine ply either side of a tassie oak core and will try food dye dipping. I know I wont get the spectacular effect of Dymondwood but it may give me a nice contrasted effect. I have made a few blanks to turn and test dip. i will however have to make same ratio of dye:water for the smalls as will be used for the my full sized handles, and a giant tube for dipping 40x400mm handles in. A piece of 50mm waste pipe and cap might do the trick. (see thread of laminated turning)

[ian]

Hi Fumbler,
I'm curious as to your preference for water based food colouring over spirit stains.
My expectation would be that spirit stains would cause less problems with raised grain.

[Mobyturns]

I already have Laminated together 2 sheets of 9mm marine ply either side of a tassie oak core and will try food dye dipping. I know I wont get the spectacular effect of Dymondwood but it may give me a nice contrasted effect. I have made a few blanks to turn and test dip. i will however have to make same ratio of dye:water for the smalls as will be used for the my full sized handles, and a giant tube for dipping 40x400mm handles in. A piece of 50mm waste pipe and cap might do the trick. (see thread of laminated turning)

Dyeing veneers is a hit and miss affair for the DIYer, even more so with ply, been there done that. I guess if you have access to pressure pots, or vacuum stabilisation gear it will be a different story. The other things to consider is that the extractives in the timber do funny things to the dye and final colour produced, and then there is the lightfastness of the dye. I have used various commercially dyed veneers and reconstituted veneers which hold their colour well. Finding thicker veneers is now like finding hens teeth. The available thin veneers won't produce the effect of Dymondwood unless you stack multiple layers and that quickly becomes a very expensive exercise for anything other than very small projects.

[Ubernoob]

I know this is far from what you want and is extremely wasteful but when finished this will be a wing for a money box(in my toy thread). The Sika PVA does do funny things with a couple of the timbers, seem to turn a bit yellow but most come up fine and a top coat brings them up like it would normally.

397697

I wonder DYMONDWOOD supplied Lightning Yo-Yos? They always had some nice colours.

[Fumbler]

Thanks, I'm not looking for deep ingrain dye, just enough to colour the handle once turned (Mobyturns) . I have seen the results from turned curly maple and I liked the finished product. In that article the turner suggested burnishing with a brown paper bag also helps. As for the spirit stains (from Ian), I'm trying to keep costs to a minimum at this point (especially when I hear the "now what are you buying? and what that for, more for those tools to turn more bloody pens"".
I'll turn my test pieces and see how they go, and will also put up here. This will ultimately be h handles for carbide cutting tool. Please see my other thread "laminated turning". just posted more pics of the polished barstock. a lot of elbow grease for that finish.

[Mobyturns]

If you are only dyeing the finished article then look up Phil Irons' demos. Plenty of turners using multiple layers of dyes as well to produce stunning effects. You threw me with the reference to Dymondwood, so I assumed you wanted different coloured layers.

[Fumbler]

apologies, not so much a multitude but just a contrast, dark blue/light blue etc. I got the idea from this pic.

[Ubernoob]

To add some useless info, I had some diluted bike wash that was clear so I decided to throw some food dye in it so I would remember what it was.
I left a bottle in the sun for a few days and the dye has faded quite a lot.

Any progress report on dying wood?

[Fumbler]

the actual dying of wood worked, but I didn't end up using it on the job I intended. Also I found that diluting the dye with water, reduced the effect dramatically and wasn't absorbed by the wood effectively enough. let me dig the test pieces out to photograph and will post.

p.s laminating several pieces f marine ply worked, turning tem, not so much. too thin a sheet, too much glue. The glue used is not very tool friendly, I found I was constantly sharpening the tools.

[TongueTied]

I just received some from CWS in the US. What I got is called Spectraply but it is the same thing. I used a re-mailer to send out here so I get reasonable shopping rates. I about 75 pen blanks and 4 log pepper mill blanks

Posted from somewhere I don't want to be.