Color Matching is a huge skill and a must in the leather Mend industry. I've been arrival over a few vehicles lately that have been dyed with not so good color matching. Knowing that it's usually person whether color blind or just down right...well I won't go that far, but if the color isn't right then your Mend will look worse then if you had just left it alone.
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Good lighting does help and pretty much a necessity. Natural lighting is good but in the garages we get stuck in the winter months it doesn't help much, but what do you do, you improvise as my wife says. I use a dent light, which works pretty good, but I have also have used a under the hood light bar then hooking inside the car that stretches the width of the car and hooks on the door jams, they work great. Shorter light bar are great for light in a small places. Be rigorous with using florescence they sometimes throw your tinting off, if you can get some natural light to your task then great. The customer sees the the car in natural light mostly anyways so your color needs to be spot on.
Leather Colors
Test a spot with a dab of leather dye on your finger, wipe a spot in the area to be repAired, dry it, and if it disappears, bingo. Otherwise tint it.
Leather fix - Color Matching Your Leather Dyes
Most of the colors we encounter in todays cars are tans, grays, blacks of course, some blues, burgundy, not many reds, but I have seen on Mustangs red bolsters, whites in some, and in the custom world, Wow look out. A lot of tricks I would love to learn in doing real custom work like custom Airbrushing in the interiors of vehicles, anyways..
The colors I use the most in my leather Mend dyes are Black, White, Yellow oxide, Red oxide, and Brown. I also use on opening Green, Blue, and Purple, rarely Yellow and Red, Silver and Gold for metallics with Pearl white to offset the side tones, and growing everyday, with the growing automotive industry. Colors and more colors, fun, fun, fun...
Of course white and black make gray, and brown and white make tan, so, add a wee black to go grayer with tan or darker with both, white to lighten, yellow oxide or red oxide to richen the color or to give the yellow or red tints you see in todays autos, brown works good sometimes but the browns seem to be on the red side, if it's too red add green to tone it down. Bmws have a blueish tint to their dyes add a wee blue or purple to the grays, Dodge add a wee red oxide to the dye to give a reddish tone, Infinity's light tan has just a hint of green to it, Chevy's have a wee bit more of a yellow-brown look to them in the darker dashes adding a wee yellow oxide gives you that tone. Ford has a pretty true grey with a wee yellow oxide though in some cases even add a wee brown, this is for both the dark and light. Ford trucks tan has kinda a pink look to it, in some older models, add red oxide but they do have a lot of yellow to them too. Cadillac is pretty easy white and brown with a hint of yellow oxide and a bit if black, just a wee though. With black tone it down for a duller look with a wee bit of white, add your duller and you have flat black sometimes a wee brown too for and older Dodge steering wheel but eliminate the duller save that for like Bmw dash pieces. Dodge light gray seats add a wee purple. Whew..that wore me out. You get the picture I hope, colors are just one of those things whether you get it or you don't.
Just test each time you add a color and look at it and see what color it's missing. I use my pigments sometimes to get there a wee Faster. If it looks like it needs a color...add it a wee at a time and dab other spot, dry it, then check again. You want it to disappear. If it does then your ready to go. Add your flex, cross-linker, strain your paint with a paper paint strainer into the cup and spray away with your leather dyes on you leather repAir. If I left something out and your having problems with a color let me know maybe I can help you frame it out.
I've never well sat down and counted the whole of cars that I have done in my 10 years in the automotive reconditioning enterprise so theres been a lot of colors fly in front of my face, the only one that has ever kicked my butt was teal, wow I spent all day when I first started on a boat seat that was teal, holy crap, that was back when I used the lacquer based systems, bad move, I had to give up. With the water based it is so much better. I found with the water based mix that green, blue and a touch of white, I got it, I think I added a wee yellow too, I try not to do to many teals, that color and me just don't get along.
Thats kinda the way I look at it when I go to mixing colors, which I do all by eye, God help me if I go color blind. I just look at the work and see the colors. It's pretty cool. Each and every car is separate no matter if they are the same identical vehicles, each one as been exposed to fully separate elements. Every color is separate I promise you, premixed dyes are fine to get you there quicker, but check a spot first before you go hog wild and just start dyeing. So tint your dyes, tweak them until they disappear. The color wheel does help, I find myself every once in a while having a brain fart and can't get a color right so I pull out the old stand by, if it's the color your trying to get rid of use it's opposite to get rid of it. Look on the wheel and the color on the opposite side of the wheel, thats it's opposite. I know that's not the accurate word for that but it sounds good. But I never start my mend until my color matching is right. If you don't think you can match it, don't do it. The customer will respect you more for your honesty. If your color doesn't match then the ending effect won't be perfect, and that's what the customer wants is perfection in leather repAir, or any repair...Right.
Make sure to apply your conditioner after your mend is done on your leather repairs. It will make your ending effect look and feel better. Top coat all your repairs with a clear topcoat, it only adds more resistance to the wear and tear and abuse that the vehicles will encounter instead of just the dye.
If you have anyone to add to this report I would love to hear from you, these tips can be used with all your color matching needs not just dyeing leather. So please jump on board and lets help all the techs out there and lend a helping hand so that we can All get one more step closer to perfection in our leather and vinyl repairs, plastic repairs, velour repairs, and floor covering dyeing.
Leather fix - Color Matching Your Leather Dyes
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