Tinting Dope

In another post someone mentioned tinting dope with Higgins Fadeproof Ink. How is this done? I suppose you can get this ink at an office supply store.

I'm also wondering exactly what the technique is. My guess is to do it like any other dye, put it in some thinner, mix, put that in dope, mix, spray, do not brush. But I'm all ears.

I looked at officedepot.com, officemax.com, and staples.com. All had it, only in black, and Staples' price was best, $2.33/oz vs. $2.79. Those places also have some huge highlighter pens that can be surgically induced to give up their ink (?). DayGlo red, etc, looks pretty hot. Black & DayGlo Red would be killer. Don't forget to give it a really good, thick topcoat, or you'll have that stuff running all over, when raw fuel gets on it. FWIW, Rit dye from the supermart (dry powder form) has a great selection of colors and looks great. I've done that, not the ink. Steve

I mix my DOPE ready to spray and then add the ink. Should be sprayed not brushed for large area's. Can be brushed for touch up's. I add about 6 drops to a pint of mixed dope. Good starting point.

Scott(hope it help's)Riese

>I mix my DOPE ready to spray and then add the ink. Should be
>sprayed not brushed for large area's. Can be brushed for
>touch up's. I add about 6 drops to a pint of mixed dope.
>Good starting point.
>

I just got back from California, and got to visit Bud Romak. He too uses the Higgins Fadeproof ink (purchased at Michael's discount craft stores) in clear dope to finish his Free Flight models. He sprays it on Polyspan, and the results are very good. He says it will work well in both nitrate and butyrate dope (free flighters like nitrate for many applications). He uses primarily red and yellow. The red is pretty much opaque, the yellow translucent. Looks like clear doped silk, but much cheaper, and much less dope needed. I didn't get the mix proportions he uses, but experiment will yield that. He masks and sprays the red first, and he claims you can then just spray the yellow areas without masking. The yellow doesn't show over the red. He uses disposable "spray can" technology where you attach the propellant canister and spray head to a bottle of whatever paint you want. No compressor, spray gun, etc. These are available from Micro Mark, IIRC, but pricey. Bud gets his cheaper from some industrial source in large quantities. All I can say is that he gets great looking results with a minimum of fuss.

FWIW,

I use a couple of techniques. I have found that you can mix the ink with alcohol and dye wood and tissue with it as a base color before doping.

If you want more intensity, then add about 2 drops of ink directly to 4 oz of dope and spray or brush that on. If you use thin dope, and cross-brush alternate coats, it comes out very even. Spraying would be better of course.

I did have trouble with some Sig Butyrate blushing to a pink I could not get rid of, but I don't know if it was a reaction to the ink or something else. Haven't tried that combo since.

Nitrate and clear epoxy have both accepted the ink OK.