I bought some 'Flexible Vinyl Paint' from Halfords thinking it was the stuff everyone calls Vinyl Dye. It says on the can it's suitable for plastics such as PVC etc and will penetrate the surface blah blah to stain the plastic. So I pulled apart my keyboard and put a coat on a part you won't see. I then left it about 6 hours and cam back. The paint seems to have covered some areas so I have a prod at it with my finger to see what it has done and low and behold it just scratches off and I get back to clean white plastic. From reading Vinyl Dye articles around the web I thought this to be odd. So I am asking has anyone ever had this problem or used this stuff from halfords and had the same crappy results?
What is the texture of your keyboard? If it is slghtly dappled then i think your paint is dodgy.. you should try some VHT stuff.
Well, the texture is slightly bumpy. It's a microsoft keyboard all of which have the same(ish) texture. I sprayed a bit on a spare mouse I had lying around and it seems to have made a better job of sinking in. We'll see in the morning tho.
Certain types of plastic dont enjoy being dyed, ive noticed. Unfortunatly, theres really no way to tell if its gonna work or not, short of actually spraying the plastic and finding out.
I found out that my keyboard's flexible cord dosen't like to be dyed. The keyboard itsself came out beautifully but the cord was (and still is) VERY sticky to the touch. The cord's pretty much ruined and I'll have to lob it off & replace it.
Well, I've sprayed all the keys since they took the dye and they have come out quite nice. I have peeled and scratched all the paint/dye off the 'keyboard surround' and decided to paint it the old fashoned way with primer colour and laquer. If it looks any good I might post some pictures of it.
i have the exact same paint, just (literally) sprayed my microsoft optical mouse, and the monitor (tft). I found it works well if you wash the plastic (good old fairy, only one drop) dry, then one very very fine coat to make the plastic grey almost. Then keep doing fine coats about 3 more. 30mins between coats. then 24 hours before re-assembling. Works wonders.
I did give the keyboard a thorough wash with fairy and water to get all the grease and grime off it. Even after that and with thin coats the paint would still scratch off. The silly thing is that the paint worked wonders on the keys but not the rest of it (I guess it is a different plastic or something). Anyway, it's now finished and I now have a black (albeit half painted half dyes) microsoft natural elite keyboard.
Black is just sooooo much better than beige have you thought about a matt varnish over the top afterwards to protect it?
I have used a gloss lacquer over the paint to give it some durability, the finish the lacquer gives after you spray it on is not too far from the texture of the keyboard to begin with so I am debating polishing it up to either keep it rough or making it mirror quality.
Thats definetly the right stuff, but it doesn't work on all plastics... Some of them it just can't penetrate.
I dont think you have the correct paint, from other forums I have heard that the paint from halfords is not actual vinyl dye, but basically paint and so at the end of the day will scratch off. I have found an excellent supplier of actual vinyl dye in the uk called US Autmotive link: http://www.usauto.co.uk/ I have found them to be a great supplier with the spray arriving a couple of days after I ordered it and also with great customer support. They provide actual vinyl dye made by VHT I think and I have had great results in spraying my xbox and controller, and am moving on to my monitor and case. I have actuallt ordered another can of the stuff to allow me to create a two tone effect. One word of warning the colours on the website dont seem to correspond very accurately with the end result. However this may be caused by the fact I am spraying them on to black plastic as opposed to a lighter colour. Happy modding!
The Halford's stuff is NOT vinyl Dye... it's vinyl PAINT. It will not dye the plastic. I've tried it on almost every type of plastic you can find, and it never once dyed it... just paints it. Save yourself the headache and get some of this stuff You can get it from here and it's cheaper than Halford's stuff. I ordered some on Monday, and it arrived Tuesday... postage free. WHY even bother with Halfords??
