r/urushi

My wife has so far very sweetly refrained from complaining about the expense of my new urushi habit, but in an effort to optimize the economics, I recently bought a kilogram of ki in a squeeze pouch. However, dispensing small quantities of urushi from that big pouch directly onto my palette is nightmarish. I remember that Michal mentioned in one of his videos having found a set of small reusable tubes that he liked, but the vendor no longer sold them, so he didn't have anything to recommend.

The photos show my attempt to figure out something safe and convenient. I bought a set of 60 mL plastic syringes on amazon, which have screw tops. These are meant to be used by people who can't take food by mouth and have to use a feeding tube. They're sold as a disposable item, but people online say they get multiple uses out of them. The screw fitting is a standard called ENFit. I'm not 100% certain, but I believe both the barrel and the gasket on the plunger are polypropylene, which has a very low surface energy, so urushi should not adhere to it. I don't know if this is actually a better way of doing this than what other people are doing, but I thought I'd post about it and see if anyone had comments or could suggest something better.

Filling the tube was a little awkward, and I ended up getting some urushi where I didn't want it. Maybe with practice I can make it less of a white-knuckle experience. Photo #3 shows the holder I made out of a cardboard egg carton, and a small glass funnel that I bought. I poured the urushi in, leaving about 10 mL of air, and then I inserted the plunger. Because the air is compressible, I was able to get the plunger to go in a few millimeters and stick. Photo #2 shows the situation after that step, with the tube sitting on the table nozzle side up and the air having risen to the top.

After that, I took off the screw cap and carefully moved the plunger deeper into the barrel. My goal was to expel as much air as possible, but to avoid making an urushi squirt-gun that would spray me in the face. Photo #1 shows the result. I put it inside a ziplock freezer bag and am planning to get a big packet of silica gel dessicant to throw in the bag as well.

Maybe filling the syringe by suction would be better and easier to control, I don't know, but that would require dispensing the right amount of urushi into some intermediate container like a bowl, and you would end up with some material wasted in the bowl.

I have also tried small 1 ounce polyethylene squeeze bottles that are sold for tattoo ink. These seemed OK, but they're so small that they would need to be refilled frequently, and as you use up more and more of the urushi in one of them, the volume will fill up with air that will contain some moisture.

This is a lacquer piece I made 9 years ago.

You can still see some imperfections in it. In order to speed up the process at that time, I only applied around 7 layers of lacquer, and some areas on the bottom were not polished evenly.

The large crack on the bottom comes from the wood joint. Over time, the natural expansion and contraction of the material caused it to split.

The small lines on the right side come from imperfections in the coating and polishing stages.

It is not a perfect piece, but I still use it every day.

It constantly reminds me of the core of working with urushi: patience, waiting, and giving full attention to every single step.

Adjusting the viscosity of a kijiro urushi with ki urushi?

I saw someone on IG add ki urushi to kuro urushi or similiar roiro kuro ururshi.

They said that they were adjusting viscosity of the kuro urushi. Anyone have any insight into how/why, affects on color, speed of hardening etc? Or why not just a thinning solvent? Color change with black wouldn't be a concern, but kijiro?

In a youtube video　https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=swCfuMXMzMI at about 6:15, the finisher of a sendai tansu is middle coating and states that he mixes in a little bit of ki ururshi to a either transparent naka urushi, or kijiro to adjust according to "conditions". Its a neat video either way. He skips thru the process, but there is some great insights into what he is doing. applying the kijiro finish to a drawer front of a Sendai Tansu.

Hello artisans,

I'm receiving a shipment of Vietnamese lacquer (Toxicodendron succedaneum, urushi relative) and I was wondering if there were any here who are interested in obtaining a bottle of it. I know how difficult it is to get outside of Southeast Asia, so I am willing to briefly bottle and sell at a loss for anyone interested in the US.

You can look up sơn mài for some more info on the craft.

The sap is similar to ki-urushi in its current state and you may use the same techniques as in urushi to process it further. Your furo is sufficient to cure this lacquer but slightly lower the temps and increase humidity slightly. It will take around 3 days or so.

It contains some urushiol, but the primary polymerization block is laccol which is softer but tougher. There have been experiments with mixing it with urushi to obtain a more desirable result.

Both laccol and urushiol have contact dermatitis risk as everyone here knows, so the obligatory warning comes here as well.

Just send me a message if you'd like a bottle and there will likely be at least a month of waiting time. You can also message me if you're outside of the US, but beware of shipping duties of course.

The shift and function keys are from a cheap set of abs caps that I sanded to a rough surface and then lacquered, the escape key is actually 3d printed from a set of tomorrow style key caps. They've been in use for a few weeks now and are quite pleasant to use. Next up will be a space bar since that's a heavily used key and should really benefit from a premium finish.

The shift key was my first try using a makie type long fine brush and it certainly is a skill all it's own