Ebonizing wood - two questions

[Cary Swoveland]

I understand some wood can be made to appear similar to ebony by staining it with at various liquids, including: 1) a concoction producted by soaking rusty steel in vinegar; 2) black stain; and 3) India ink (oil- or water-based).

I have two questions:

1. What wood species works best for this?

2. How thick can the wood be to be black all the was through, depending, possibly, on the wood species, ebonizing fluid and method of application (e.g., soaking).

Cary

[Bernie Weishapl]

Cary I don't know about the rest but have used minwax ebony stain. It works pretty well.

[Marvin Hasenak]

I have the best luck with walnut, the vinegar mix will turn walnut almost jet black. I take a steel wood pad and tear it up and put it in a quart jar of vinegar, you have to wait at least a week. Soak a rag and wipe down the walnut, and it will slowly react and turn black. Make sure you use a non oiled steel wool pad.

I keep a jar of that mix going all of the time, it does a wonderful job on maple. Makes it look a greenish grey, I do a lot of game calls and that is one of the most requested dye jobs.

Marvin

[Malcolm Tibbetts]

Cary, I used the vinegar/rusty steel wool mixture very successfully to turn walnut veneer black (all the way through); it takes at least 24 hours of soaking. After soaking, I place the veneer sheets between white paper towels and clamp the stack between pieces of MDF for several weeks in order to maintain flatness while they dry. I've seen ebonized walnut boards as thick as 1/2" turned black all the way through, but I think a vacuum set-up was used. Woods that are high in tannin acid such as walnut and oak seem to work best. To mimic ebony, walnut works best.

[Tom Klass]

The one cabinet shop I worked in had a lot of ex-employee's from Kittengers Furniture(made stuff for white house), they would use cherry said to look more like ebony's grain pattern. That's what I've been using as the wood and india ink as the dye water based I also use water base laquare. Some of the pieces I've done have been sent out to Tucson Az. Penitration of the dye I don't really know how deep it goes, never needed to worry about it.

[Kurt Bird]

Carl,
If you do the steel wool and vinegar, don't forget to vent the jar. One of the byproducts of the mix is Hydrogen.

[Curt Fuller]

Carl,
If you do the steel wool and vinegar, don't forget to vent the jar. One of the byproducts of the mix is Hydrogen.

Now there's an idea. Grind up all the old junk yard cars, mix it with vinegar, and make hydrogen to fuel the new cars.

I like a couple coats of india ink for something absolute black out of almost any wood.

[Jay Drew]

I haven't tried it yet but I was told that you can paint ordinary tea on any wood, let it dry and then treat with the steel wool/vinegar mix. I guess the tea provides the tannin that some woods lack.

[Gary Herrmann]

I've used india ink. Works very well on maple.

[Harold Tinling]

I like to use black walnut for ebonizing. I get it all sanded and then use black shoe dye on it. It may raise the grain so I'll give it another coat and sand it lightly. The final finish is black shoe polish.
Works for me.

[Cary Swoveland]

...I've seen ebonized walnut boards as thick as 1/2" turned black all the way through, but I think a vacuum set-up was used...

That's interesting, Malcomb. With just soaking--say, walnut--can you get full penetration with boards up to 1/4"? Would you expect about the same depth of penetration for the steel and vinegar mix as for other inks, dyes and stains that could be used?

Cary

[Cary Swoveland]

Carl,
If you do the steel wool and vinegar, don't forget to vent the jar. One of the byproducts of the mix is Hydrogen.

Ah, yes. That brings back fond memories of my childhood, when we'd mix lye, water and aluminum foil in a glass pop bottle, and attach a balloon to the top of the bottle. After it was inflated, we'd tie it off, attach a fuse and let it go. We usually did that at night, for the best effect.

Cary

[robert hainstock]

I use a solution called ferric nitrate to makke the figure realy pop on curly and birdseye maple. This is acttualy pretty much the same as the vineger(citric acid) . Ferric nitrate is made of iron particles and nitric acid. Either of them are basicly liquid rust. Last week st our turning club meeting the vineger solution was demostrated. It seems to work pretty well. Good luck whatever you try.
Bob

[Andrew Nemeth]

Cary,

I think I remember reading you can use a pressure cooker to get much deeper penetration of color into smaller pieces of wood. I would think dyes would work much better than stains. I would be careful using anything flammable (i.e. steel wool + vinegar = hydrogen or oil based stains) unless you know what you are doing. The pressure actually ruptures the cell walls of the wood allowing larger particles and liquid to penetrate. I also believe this speeds up the drying time of wet wood. I have never actually needed to try this, but it did make a lot of sense when I saw it. Unfortunately, it was many years ago and I have no idea where the info came from. Maybe someone on here can add more info such as time/temp and specific dye recommendations.

If you are looking to do larger piece, why don't you post what you are trying to do, there may be another approach that might work.

Good Luck!

[Cary Swoveland]

......If you are looking to do larger piece, why don't you post what you are trying to do, there may be another approach that might work.

Good point, Andrew (and interesting idea of using a pressure cooker). I should have mentioned how I planned to use the ebonized wood. I want to try my hand at segmented turning, and figure I'd want to use ebonized venners, usually no more than 1/8" thick, but perhaps up to 1/4".

Cary