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Has anyone had any luck coloring horn? I notice there are dyed horn plates available in red and green. Not sure how it's done, but I dropped a small piece of horn into my leather dye to see if it will saturate. Not sure it will hold the color even if it does saturate, but thought it was worth asking.

Coloured horn? My, my! Never too old to learn.

Well if I don't have anyone else chiming in with their own experimentation results, I'll put mine up when I get around to pulling it out of the dye. If it looks saturated, I'll hit it with the heat gun and see if I can get the color to come back out easily. I am most worried about longevity of the color with this "soak" process.

I think in order to dye horn, you need some way to draw the color into the pores. I presume you'd do that with a vacuum pump. I've never attempted it though. For me, horn is beautiful enough on its own, so I don't know why you'd want to dye it.

I would bet the colored horn is done by adding dyes to the stabilizing vacuum.

That makes sense. Maybe I'll make a homemade vaccum jar to try this.

The only reason I'm even thinking about coloring it is to keep the theme of a set of 3 pipes.

Check out the American Long Rifle Forum, I remember seeing that they dye horn. But simply, they use Rit Dye or ferric nitrate.

What about tea? An old friend of mine swore by tea. Hot tea and soak it. I would think that the heat would open the pores. I know it works for bone and antler.

Good day!
The horn is pretty easy to paint.
If one condition is met. The horn must first be degreased. For surface staining, it will be enough to hold the horn in alcohol for 2 - 3 hours. For deep staining (approx. 1.5 - 2 mm), use another agent.
Take a 5% soda ash solution or a 10% solution of any means for removing dirt in sewer pipes. An ordinary Tiret will do. In this solution, the horn needs to be boiled for 7 to 8 hours. The smell will be awful, so it's best to do this work outside. Then the same amount in ordinary water, constantly changing it in order to remove alkali from the horn.
You can color the horn by placing it in an alcoholic tea tincture. Get a long-lasting brown. It will not fade in the sun. Or in an alcoholic tincture of onion peel. The color will be reddish brown.
These natural dyes will give you a warm color.
It can also be dyed in alcoholic aniline dyes, but the color will be cold.
I dyed ordinary cow bone in a similar way. She steadfastly survived all the procedures. I think the horn will take them too.

Best regards, Odissey

I suddenly remembered that the horn is based on the protein keratin. This is the same protein that forms the basis of our hair. Therefore, hair dye is probably the best option. Try it.