Bleeding Tie Dye Shirts ?

Question

I use the RIT tie dye packets and the color bleeds and goes out of the shirt when I wash it. Any ideas

Answer 1

I do not know how to keep the color from bleeding but only washing it in cold water.  here is an idea to make tie-dye shirts: take a white t-shirt and twist it really tight and tie rubber bands around it and pour food coloring in a shallow bowl and dip the  t-shirt in it , but do not soak or it will not turn out right

Answer 2

Neither soda ash nor vinegar will help to set the Rit dye on your cotton shirts. Soda ash works only for the fiber reactive dyes used in tie-dye kits; it cannot help at all with Rit dye. Vinegar, which is commonly suggested by people who do not understand dyes, won't help at all either, as long as you are dyeing cotton. Vinegar does not help to set dye on cotton.

Rit dye always fades quickly and runs in the wash. That's the nature of the dye. If you want dye that does not run or bleed, buy a good tie dye kit. Any fiber reactive dye will work. Go to your local crafts store and look for a tie-dye kit made by Jacquard, Dylon, Rainbow Rock, or Tulip. You can also buy individual fiber reactive dye colors at a good crafts store. Look for Jacquard Procion MX, or Tulip One Step Fashion Dye, or Dylon Permanent dye.

The only way to stop Rit dye from fading is to soak it in hot water with a special commercial dye fixative. This dye fixative does not contain salt, vinegar, or soda ash, and you cannot make it at home. One well-known brand of dye fixative is called Retayne. Sometimes you can find this for sale in Joann's fabric stores, or you can find it in any good quilting supply store. You can also buy it by mail-order from any good dye supplier, but if you're going to do that, you might as well just order some good dyes while you're at it, and use them instead of Rit.

The makers of Rit dye have recently introduced their own brand of cationic dye fixative that is equivalent to Retayne. It is called Rit Dye Fixative. If you can find this product, it will probably work just as well as Retayne.

One last note: did you use 100% cotton shirts? If you used polyester, or polyester blend shirts, no ordinary dye will stick to them. Rit will never work on polyester, no matter what fixative you use. Polyester can be dyed only with a special kind of polyester dye called disperse dye, which you can never find in local stores.

Answer 3

try rinsing the shirt in a small tub of vinegar (or vinegar and water solution)

it should make the dye set into the shirt.

good luck

Answer 4

Does the RIT package recommend ways to set the dye?  I have heard in general the way to prevent loosing color in dark jeans or black or red clothing is to soak it in white vinegar and cold water.  Use 2/3 cup of white vinegar to a gallon of water.  Let things soak for up to 15 minutes then wash and dry according to the manufacturers recommendations.

Answer 5

The shirt needs to be soaked in soda ash solution for thirty minutes.  Also make sure the dye is mixed with urea.

The soda ash makes the fabric more receptive to the dye.

The urea makes the dye react longer with the fabric.

procion dye will give better results.

If you go to Dharma Trading company's website there are how tos.

look under information:

http://www.dharmatrading.com/tie-dye/