chemistry

[pennsyscot]

Has anyone tried this or a similar recipe for blackening wood? http://www.mugwumps.com/blacken.htm
I'm tired of my base color lifting and muddying my light stain. Are there any online suppliers from whom
I can obtain all these ingrediants? Thanks

[LexKY_Pipe]

Hmm. Tried the link but it appeared broken.

[pennsyscot]

Don't know what happened to the link, here is the recipe:


M. Konick, in the British Journal of Photography, suggests the following method of blackening wood, which has the advantage of resisting acids and alkalies:


A
Cuprice cloride, 75 parts
Sodium chlorate, 67 parts
Water, 1000 parts


B
Aniline hydrochlorate, 150 parts
Water, 1000 parts

Paint the wood with A and a short time after with B, and remove with a damp cloth the yellow powder that forms. Repeat this operation every day till the desired color is obtained, and then rub the wood with vaselin or linseed oil. By using potassium bichromate instead of the soda salt, a good black color is obtained at once.


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[NathanA]

Never tried the recipe, but I am a science teacher and those chemicals can be had at any scientific supply store. Just google scientific supplies and you should have plenty of options. Some will only sell to schools but there should be plenty who will sell to the public. Depending on the chemical, shipping costs might be high if they are considered hazmat, but those you listed seem pretty benign.

[ND Pipes]

i am wondering what Aniline hydrochlorate is... i have found chlorite but no chlorate... can somebody help me with the third chemical - what it is.... - thanks...

[KurtHuhn]

The two words are interchangeable, if I recall my chemistry.

It depends on grammatical style. For instance, "Aniline Hydrochloride" would be the same thing as "hydrochlorate of aniline" - the same chemical, and the same descriptive name, but "hydrochlorate" indicates an action taken upon the second chemical in the phrase.

In either case it refers to the resultant chemical salt that you get from reacting aniline with hydrochloric acid.

Chemical names are typically a lot like numerical equations. If you break apart the name you tend to get the individual constituents.

[Tyler]

Chlorate and chlorite are not synonyms. They are chemically two different things. A chlorate has an one more oxygen atom attached to the chlorine than does a chlorite. Chlorate is -ClO3, while chlorite is -ClO2.

I have no knowledge of this staining process or recipe, nor do I know where to get the right ingredients. I just wanted to clarify that while substituting MAY work, chlorite and chlorate are different.

[KurtHuhn]

That confuses things then - chlorate, chloride, chlorite.

Now I'm pretty sure I don't remember anything from chemistry class....

[baweaverpipes]

What about eye of newt?

Seriously, when contrast staining you need to be careful after sanding off the undercoat, keeping the highlights. With the contrast stain, you need to only do one coat, by going over the pipe in smooth strokes, rotating the pipe cleaner as you go from one swath to the next. The pick up of the other stain should be minimal. It will not bleed.
It's not any magic formula.

[Sasquatch]

This isn't merely contrast staining thoug - the idea here is that you are oxidizing the wood and not just pushing dye into pores/empty spaces.

[caskwith]

I couldn't possibly comment on how good this stuff is

[KurtHuhn]

The resurfacing of this thread stirred something up, and I had to go looking again.

Here's a link to a thread that has a similar makeup:
viewtopic.php?f=18&t=3236&start=0

In that recipe the chemicals are brasschloride, natriumchlorat, and anilinhydrochloride.

I did a little investigation at the time and found that the common English names are copper chloride, sodium chlorate, and aniline hydrochloride (that last one was easy ).

All of these are fairly common chemicals, and you should be able to get them at any decent chemistry retailer.

As always though, use caution. I'd hate to hear of pipe makers with exploding trousers .

[billiard]

I know nothing of chemistry. I do know that some old timers darken wood by throwing some rusty nails into vinegar for a several days and then use this liquid to brush on the wood and letting it sit a spell - is this producing the same chemicals and would it be a quicker/easier way to try this?

EDIT TO ADD:
Thought I should be vaguely worthwhile to the forum so I just put a handful of 16p nails in a mason jar, covered with vinegar, and will let it sit a few days. Will then sand some cut off bit of briar smooth, coat it, let sit a few days and post a pic of results in about a week if anyone is interested to see results.

Thanks,
Bill

[KurtHuhn]

That particular trick depends on tannins in the wood reacting with the iron in the vinegar. Since briar has very little tannins thanks to the processing it undergoes, I can't imagine it would darken appreciably.

You can add tannins back in to the surface by using tannin available at your local homebrew store, then after that dries, applying the vinegar and iron solution - which is now simple Iron Acetate.

Trever and I worked this subject over pretty exhaustively a couple years ago. We decided that, while it produces a decent contrast, it was a lot of work for something that can be achieved by using good leather stains and judicious sanding.

[billiard]

Thanks Kurt, I will dump this jar then.

[KurtHuhn]

To be honest, for a lot of folks, it's best to concentrate on making really nice pipes, and leave the unusual finishing procedures until they can make a pipe worthy of high contrast staining.

That's not to say that I wish anyone to stop experimenting - that's the part about this that's so fun! Figuring out new and easier ways of doing stuff is something I personally enjoy a whole hell of a lot. I think everyone should experiment, and find the next big breakthrough. Or, just do it for fun! My house is one big science experiment, and at any given point, the kids and I are destroying, creating, denaturing, or exploding all sort of things.

But, when it comes to pipe making, I try to stick with what saves time and is efficient.

That said, I don't know that you need to dump your creation, since you never know when you might need some iron acetate.