Hi,
Does anyone have any suggestions as to the best way to colour floor tile grout, please. I do not need a huge amount and the closest colour I can find is "sandstone" in B and Q but in a 5kg bag! There are smaller packages but in white or grey and, ideally, I need a dark brown or even black.
Any ideas of how to colour these, please?
Many thanks,
Peter
Cement dyes should work, or soot. You could probably use a powder paint from an art shop
I tried colouring emulsion with powder paint once: amazing how much of it you need to actually colour anything, but did manage some nice wall paintings in the end. Had to spray lacquer over to seal though.
If you are only needing a little: Indian Ink might be sufficient and you can often get it quite cheaply in those always 'just closing down' book/art shops like 'The Works'.
The 'Early Learning Centre' used to do big pots of powder paint quite cheaply, if you do decide on that line: but these of course would not be water proof, and even if you mixed them as if they were pigments, in a non aqueous solution like varnish, you would still find they managed to run if you spilt water on them and then scuffed.
I expect that a 'proper' black pigment would turn out to be lamp black/soot/charcoal, as noted by Stuart, and as used in many black things such as tyres.
S
Easy enough to buy 500gms of Feb black oxide cement dye, but that would probably leave 499 gms unused :-) They say beech soot is a nice browny black, much prized by artists IIRC
A better option would be to use the 1kg bag from the Mapei range at Screwfix:
They have beige as well. £3.29, I use it whenever I am grouting, and find it really good. Alan.
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