Well, until I can find out more about the RIT powder dye, I went with all I could get locally, the RIT liquid dye. Testing over the hours since I last posted is showing a decent trace on the chart.
The only thing I'm wondering about now is mold over the long term. Especially with sugar as an additive, I wonder if there's anything I could add to the ink to act as a mold inhibitor?
You must have a democrat (non-working) internet connection.
Not to change the subject too much as I am trying to research this ink, but for several years, I'd get a 404 every time I visited the Lowe's website. I even told them about it at the store one time and they had no clue. In my case, it turned out to be No Script's fault. Even though it showed that I was allowing script for the website, that wasn't entirely true. Once fully enabled, I could again access Lowe's.
Not aniline but it will likely work. Might fade with time - aniline won't.
As far as the mold issue - Glyserine is sometimes used as a preservative - might not be a problem.
I agree with the OP that it is a legitimate concern as pointed out in this publication:
"The inks were prepared on July 9. On October 2 they were inspected, and it was found that some of the corks of the tubes in which the inks had been kept were moldy . When shaking the tubes to dissolve the dyes, all the corks had been wet with the inks. Of the inks made with equal volumes of glycerol and water, six con-tained dyes that permitted the growth of mold. Three, and possibly four, species of mold were growing and fruiting on the corks. With the mixture of 1 volume of glycerol and
3 volumes of water, there were 13 moldy corks, and in addition mold was growing on the sur-face of 3 of the inks. No mold could be detected on the corks that had been in contact with the inks made with ethylene glycol at either dilution."The issue is that they didn't provide a solution other than using ethylene glycol, but the OP has already mixed his with the glycerin (and also sugar according to the formula mentioned here which would be a further attractor of mold).
I know with standing water sometimes, to prevent mold, a small amount of bleach is added. Perhaps a few drops of bleach might do the trick, although not sure how this would affect the ink solution. Another possibility might be added alcohol, but might be more upsetting to the solution as a greater quantity than bleach would most likely be needed.
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