Direct dyes for cotton, rayon, silk and nylon

Strong dyes - require only cooking salt and very hot to boiling water for easy dyeing. Dyes have a good light fastness but only moderate wash fastness . Wash fastness is improved by after-treatment of dyed article with solution (30 ml per litre of water) of DYEFIX. These dyes are principally used in dyeing articles for "markets", T-shirts, curtains and theatre productions.

100 gram of will dye 4 kilo of dry fabric to dark shade.

Solar is a registered trademark of Clariant.

Solar Dye Instructions

Strong dyes - require only cooking salt and very hot or boiling water for easy dyeing. SOLAR dyes are used on cellulose fibers such as cotton, rayon, and linen. They lack the permanence of the cold water fiber reactive dyes which most serious dyers prefer for use on cellulose fibers, but in some cases they have advantages that make their use worthwhile. For example, while many of the direct dyes are not very lightfast, there are some dyes in the class that may be more lightfast than similar shades of fiber reactive dyes. All direct dyes do perform rather poorly with respect to washfastness. Without an appropriate after-treatment, direct dyes bleed a little with every washing, losing their brightness and endangering other clothes washed in the same load. However, there are special after-treatments which may be used to solve this problem. (Vinegar is not among them! In spite of claims you may see to the contrary, you cannot use vinegar to set any dye on cotton or other cellulose materials.) A product named DYEFIX (30 ml per litre of water), which is an ionic bulking agent which essentially "glues" the dye into the fiber, works very well to make fabric dyed with direct dyes washable without bleeding of the dye.

These dyes are principally used for dyeing articles for "markets", curtains and theatre productions. 100 gram will dye 4 kilo (9 lb.) of dry fabric to dark shade. 

RECIPE

NEEDED: Dye, Cooking salt (dissolve before adding to dye bath), Boiling water

Each kilo (2.2lb) dry material requires between 15 - 20 litre (4 -5 gallons) of water. Ideally the fabric should be dyed at boiling temperature for 30 minutes, however if that is not possible, the dyes will perform adequately in very hot water. It is also possible to dye relatively cold water providing the material is left in the dye bath for 8 hours.

Nylon is dyed for 30 minutes at the boil.

For paler colours, just add more water. For tie-dyeing, maintain temperature as high as possible during the entire dyeing.
Rinse material under cold running water until water runs almost clear.

NB. Black should be dyed at 50-60° C only, and NO salt should be used with Scarlet !!