Brown Sail Dye/where to buy?

[luskin]

We want to make our white sails brown and have heard there are dyes. Does anyone know what kind one should buy and where? (sorry. Posted this twice by accident, and can't find a delete button)

[RichH]

Dyeing of polyester fabric by DIY process is very difficult and usually will result in quite poor 'colorfastness'. If you want 'brown' sails suggest you get new sails already coloured to 'tanbark'.

Polyester dyeing made simple - Express Textile

[luskin]

The thing is the boat we're about to buy already has an old pair of sails, so we wouldn't have to buy new sails. We are filming an Indie movie, and want that look. So, we thought we'd give it a go with the old sails. What is the DIY process?

[HDChopper]

DIY = Do It yourself ....

[COOL]

Dacron sailcloth has resins and other surface
treatments applied during finishing that would
likely prevent a dye from 'taking' evenly.
The dyeing of the fabric would have to take
place before the yarns are coated.
For your film project, and if the sails
will not need to be truely fuctional
in the future, you might experiment with
painting the sails.

[sailingdog]

The problem is that painted sails won't film the same as tanbark sails would. The reflectance, the texture, etc., will all be wrong, even if you get the color right.

Originally Posted by COOL

Dacron sailcloth has resins and other surface
treatments applied during finishing that would
likely prevent a dye from 'taking' evenly.
The dyeing of the fabric would have to take
place before the yarns are coated.
For your film project, and if the sails
will not need to be truely fuctional
in the future, you might experiment with
painting the sails.

[heinzir]

I mail ordered some surplus nylon material for a cockpit awning many years ago. I believe the ad said that it was "roll ends" and no color choice was allowed. But the price was great and really was all that I could afford. I had hoped they would send me blue to match the sail covers. What I got was bright, bright, bright, almost flourescent PINK!
I tried dying it several times but it always came out splotched, almost tie dyed. Then I tried painting it and it looked even worse. I finally gave up!

As already mentioned, dying actual sail cloth would be even more difficult because of the resins coating the cloth.

Luskin, what size boat are you talking about? Is it a dinghy, day sailer, trailer sailer, cruiser? How big are the sails? You might be able to find tanbark sails on ebay, Craigslist, or one of the used sail brokers such as Bacon & Associates.