Professional Aluminum Anodizing Pigment Dyes | Black E-CRO | Light to Rich Black | Powder Concentrate Makes 7.6 Liters or 2 Gallons

RIT doesn't work. Don't do it. This is expensive but worth it. Don't waste time with RIT like I did. I ended up with gritty, splotchy, barely-dyed, reddish parts. I thought I was doing something wrong. I was. I was using RIT dye. After switching to this, my parts went from "I don't know what I'm doing" to "anodizing master". Don't make the mistake I did.

This is my first attempt ever to anodize aluminium. It took over a month to receive this dye (the nickel acetate sealant only took a week) but this is a good product.I tested this on a 1x2" piece of 6061 3mm aluminium suspended with non-anodized 2.5mm wire (both off Amazon). I buffed it and cleaned in hot water with some detergent, then 30 seconds in 2% sodium hydroxide @30'C, then 90 minutes anodizing at 4.5ASF (485mA/dm2) @24'C - for this piece that amounted to 160mA (Low Current Density method recommended by Caswell). I used 2 thin (1mm) strips of aluminium for cathodes (40mm x 110mm) - for my largest pieces this gives an anode:cathode ratio of 3:1 but in this small test it was closer to 1:5.I used sodium hydrogen sulphate (22.5%) which is equivalent to 16% sulphuric acid.I dyed for 15 minutes @60'C then sealed in nickel acetate for 15 minutes @99'C.I only mixed 1/6 of the dye (10g dissolved in water to 1270ml @82'C) and 1/6 of the nickel acetate too.

I ordered 3 bottles of these dyes, black, blue and red. I got the black first, used it and it worked perfectly! The bottle was full to the top.I then got the red and the bottle was almost empty. Me being a rookie anodizer, I didn't realize black takes more dye than the other colors so it's normal for the red and blue bottles to only have a teaspoon or so in them.I called Interactivia's customer service number that's listed in their profile and talked to a VERY helpful guy. He's done anodizing himself and not only answered my question on why the red and blue bottles were only partially filled, he gave me some awesome advice on the anodizing process.To have customer service like that is amazing these days. I REALLY appreciated the quick response to my phone call and having a helpful person on the other end. Thanks!

This stuff is well worth it. I'm new to anodizing, but have done some copper/nickel plating, so I know cleanliness is king. But a good quality dye is a close second. My first 3 batches I tried to anodize 6061T6 at 4.5 and 6 A/ft^2, dying black with RIT powder and they came out terrible... gold, brown, flares of blue and yellow, you name it. Everything but black. Using this dye at 4.5A/ft^2 with the same process yeilded nice black parts on the first shot. It is expensive, but buying RIT for black is throwing money away and worse, reworking parts.

good

The results are very disappointing. Followed directions and the first of six parts came out fantastic with a deep black, second part had red undertones. The same protocol was used for both parts in the processing. I cannot recommend this product for more than a single part with a surface area less than 64 square inches. Look for and purchase a liquid dye that is not RIT.There is no difference in the outcome with this powdered dye and RIT.Waste of time and money.Buyer beware.

TLDR; this dye works spectacularly-if your setup and anodizing methodology is sound. Otherwise it sucks, but that's not the dye's fault.At first, I did NOT like this dye very much. It was super fussy-the color was about as deep as a puddle, the dye time had to be incredibly long to get much of any results, heating it up is a pain, the pH has to be in a certain range, these rather expensive bottles only make 7.6L of the stuff, etc. I was getting pretty tragic results even after a week and a half of testing, and the final nail in the coffin that cemented my distaste for this dye was that it began clumping up, leaving fugly marks on my parts. I switched to Rit for a bit, and it worked a little better, but I still wasn't getting good results. I was following the instructions on the bottle for this dye to a T, or so I thought...However, after heating the dye up to about 80°C and mixing it around thoroughly, the game COMPLETELY flipped on its head. It removed the clumps and the more thorough mixing allow it to work as intended, and boy does it work now! The pictures should speak for themselves. I cleaned up other aspects of my anodizing procedure and it works amazingly well on these bead blasted parts.For reference, I'm using a 20% sodium bisulphate (aka NaHSO4 aka pH decreaser for hot tubs and pools) solution for anodizing the parts, following the 720 rule for current and anodizing time, and I'm using the instructions on the bottle for the dyeing step. A distilled water rinse is done between bath changes.If you want to use this dye, especially if you're new to anodizing aluminum, be prepared to experiment. A lot. A ton. Dozens of times. Be patient and double check your setup. You can always strip off a bad anodizing job with 3 minutes in a 2% lye (NaOH) solution and try again. Get the process right on some scrap parts before doing production runs. Check the pH of your solutions periodically. WEAR SAFETY GEAR. And most importantly, don't give up hope until you've exhausted all viable options! Black in aluminum is hard to get right.There are no guarantees it'll work out for everyone of course, but I was ready to slam this stuff in this review 3 days ago-and now I'm telling you it's worth the price of admission. That should say a lot about the quality of this dye! Ngl though it IS super annoying to get it working as intended, but that's mostly my lack of experience showing more than anything else.