After reading so much about the amazing faux clay chip, I decided to buy some and try a little project. I wanted to have a big tournament set that I could buy cheaply, and this seemed to be one possible solution.
The challenge that I set for this project: to make a quality tournament set of poker chips as cheaply as possible. Note that I did not say that I wanted to make the cheapest set possible; it had to be something good enough that I could actually use it in a game with my friends. But I deliberately tried to cut corners as much as possible.
Given my history of underwhelming success in crafty-type projects like this, I expected that in a short while, I would be selling a heavy box full of oddly-colored, polka-dot poker chips, on eBay. But buoyed by the reassurances of C-T members, and their well-written step-by-step instructions on dying faux clays (not to mention the pictures proving that others had actually done this), I decided to give it a try.
So I set off on my quest, with the following restrictions: 1. No expensive gear could be used for the chip coloring, everything had to be available at the Dollar Tree store (except the Rit dye.) 2. Using the stove was off-limits; microwaving was allowed for water only. 3. Only three boxes of dye could be purchased. Any other colors would have to be custom mixed. 4. At least one of the smaller denominations must be original white, to save time and energy. 5. Labels must be purchased blank, then designed and printed by myself; OR the chips must be cold-stamped with a design and denomination.
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So I started by ordering 1000 chips from Discount Casino Gear on a Saturday. I decided to get 100 red to compare them to the white ones, and possibly take a shortcut. (Two days after I ordered these, the talk of C-T was the gray faux clay suddenly available. I would have ordered 100 gray also, if I could have.) DCG shipped me my chips PDQ (terrific service and great price, I highly recommend them).
I opened the box to examine them. I like the feel and texture of the BCC flame mold chips that I have picked up here and there. So I was really surprised when I handled the faux clays. I think they are similar in feel to my BCC Bonds, and compare very favorably to them when you consider the price difference. I was really happy with the fauxs already.
Now that I had the chips, it was time to purchase the supplies. I bought 3 boxes of Rit dye at K-Mart; it was cheaper there than Hobby Lobby. I got navy blue, scarlet, and golden yellow -- the primary colors (not as many choices at K-Mart, unfortunately).
At Dollar Tree, I purchased 4 baking pans (two for $1), 2 microwave bowls (also two for $1), a bag of wooden cooking spoons ($1), two pot holder pads ($1 each), and a timer ($1). I didn't really need the timer, but I thought it might be usable as a cheap blinds timer too. For a $1 timer, it works pretty well. I already had a couple of $1 plastic tablecloths from Dollar Tree; I would recommend adding a couple of those to your list, if you try this at home.
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Two pans would be used to dye chips, 50 per pan, so 2 batches at a time would be possible. I microwaved water in the 2 micro bowls, and poured the hot water into the 2 pans (each pan was sitting on a pot holder pad, with a cheap tablecloth underneath everything, to protect the table). After mixing up the dye solutions and stirring well, I poured the two batches together for even color, and then poured about half the solution back into the first pan. I dumped 50 chips into each pan, and stirred them around well for the first 2-3 minutes.
I knew this would take longer than dying the chips on a hot stove, but since cold dying had been used for edgespotting, I figured this would work too, eventually -- and it did. Since time was not an object, I left the chips in the pans for varying amounts of time while I did other things, stirring them occasionally to flip over and separate any bunches of chips.
20 to 30 minutes didn't seem to be quite enough to dye the chips evenly with this method, so I started leaving them in for 45, 60, even 90 minutes. Those times worked very well -- time in the dye is definitely a factor in getting deep, even color.
I punched a few holes in the center of the third pan, to use it as a strainer; the fourth pan would sit underneath that one, and catch the used dye as I poured it out of the chip pans. This worked well, although you must be careful (1) not to spill the dye on the table when you pour it out, because these cheap baking pans are thin and will flex, and (2) keep an eye out for the pans to develop small leaks from flexing after you lift them repeatedly. (If they do, then buy 2 more for $1.)
After draining the dye out, I took the pans of chips and rinsed them thoroughly in cold water, then dried them with paper towels and set the chips out to air dry.
I started by trying to make just one one pan of green chips, using blue and yellow. The first batch came out a celery color. After I rinsed them, I saw that they were a little bit splotchy, probably because I took them out too soon. I tried to reuse the dye for a second batch, and those were really splotchy and weak. So I put them aside.
Next I made a new batch of navy blue with a little yellow added, and left them in for a longer time. This made the chips a dark denim blue (almost black). I made 200 like that; and then a batch of 50 pure navy blue that turned out somewhat lighter than the others, and more like a deep purple. (I'll use those for a separate cash set.) Then I did 50 pure scarlet, and they turned out really nicely but much lighter than the original reds. So I tried mixing scarlet with a touch of navy, and got 100 dark red chips that were close to the original reds.
I mixed some of the leftover red solution with a touch of the leftover blue, and the solution turned dark cherry color. Then I dumped in the weak second batch of 50 green chips, and re-dyed them for 60 minutes. They came out a nice chocolate brown. Meanwhile, some of the other leftover red got mixed with a generous helping of yellow, and this made 50 orange chips that came out great. Then just for fun, I made some pink snappers for the cash set, by putting 25 whites in the leftover red solution for only about 7 minutes.
Finally, I made 100 pure golden yellow chips, which came out really well too. At that point, I actually started to believe that this project might work. But there was still plenty of work to do.
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I had decided that the cheapest way to finish these would be to coldstamp them with Stazon ink. I picked up a pad of black Stazon from Meijer (half price sale on art supplies, cost $3.49), and bought a stamp I liked on eBay for $2. I set out the 100 dark red chips and started stamping my design.
After doing the 100 reds, I stepped back and looked at them, and didn't like them. Back to the drawing board.
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Before I found Chiptalk, I had dice chips, and I had bought some vinyl labels for them from labelsbythesheet.com. I experimented with some of the leftover labels on a few of the faux clays. I could put vinyl labels on one side and did not experience any problems with spinners, but two labels rubbed together a bit. So I decided to label the fauxs on one side only -- saving money and making the set work better as well.
I visited labelsbythesheet.com, and found fluorescent colored 1" labels (yellow, green, orange) on clearance sale. I knew the paper labels would be thicker than the vinyl ones, but I decided to take a chance. So I bought a bunch of those (and a few vinyl ones for another project...), although I should have bought a few sheets of a fourth color at regular price, too.
I had a label design in mind, and I finished it up while waiting on the labels to arrive in the mail. Then I printed the sheets of labels when I got them, using the Word template that I had saved from the dice chip project. The paper labels were supposed to be for inkjet, but my test labels smeared even after drying for a couple of days. So I tried some labels in a laser printer instead, and this worked much better. (I would advise anyone trying to use cheap paper labels in an inkjet printer to spray something on them to protect them, or they might just turn into a big mess.)
When I had printed all the labels I needed, I started the long process of sticking the labels on all those chips.
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Next came another big hurdle: creating edgespots. I considered coloring parts of the chips to make virtual edgespots. But it looked too difficult for me, considering my lack of craft project skills.
But I still had the black Stazon ink pad, and I wanted to try using that to make edgespots (only on the chip edges, I wasn't going to fool around with the chip faces.) So I bought a pack of cheap erasers in different shapes for $1. Then I used a triangle-shaped eraser as a stamp.
I separated 100 fauxs into groups of 7. I lined up the labels and the dice mold, and then set each group in a chip rack, my edgespot target area centered at 12 o'clock. I stamped the eraser's edge on the ink pad, and then rolled the inky eraser edge across the edges of the chips, one group at a time. 7 chips per group was just about right for the eraser that I used; but if you have a larger eraser, your mileage may vary. I found that a rolling motion worked better than a flat stamping motion, which seemed to put too much ink on the chips (read on...)
I did about 100 chips on one edge, then set the racks on the table to dry. I tilted the chips at an angle, to separate the edges and help them dry. Then I went back a few hours later and did the opposite edges.
After letting them dry for a few hours (or even overnight), I rubbed the edgespots with a dry paper towel to remove any excess. Occasionally the dyed fauxs would produce a very light smudge on the towel, but usually not much ink rubbed off, if any. The original reds did much worse; quite a bit rubbed off, and about half of them had to be restamped (but I didn't have to restamp any of the dyed fauxs.) So the original reds needed much more drying time.
After my learning process with the original reds, I started stamping two groups of 7 chips from each stamp on the ink pad. I was still getting plenty of ink on the eraser's edge, and by using it twice, I had even less ink rub off on the paper towel.
I didn't want to just use black ink, especially since the blue and brown chips really needed some light colored edgespots, and apparently Stazon Opaque cotton white is best for that purpose. So I stopped in at Hobby Lobby, as their ink pads were half price that week. (Unfortunately, they didn't have any Stazon Opaque in stock there, so I will have to buy some online to finish the project.)
But I picked up a forest green Stazon ink pad, which I used on the white chips as the main edgespot color -- and it also made a great contrasting edgespot on the yellow and green chips (which I had already made 2 black edgespots on.)
I did a wide green edgespot on the yellows, and got too much ink on them. But when I rubbed them with a paper towel (after drying for a few hours), the excess ink rubbed off, the green color lightened nicely, and this left the edgespots with an unexpected marbled effect -- a cool surprise.
The white fauxs do feel different to me than the original reds (as others have said also), and I think they held the ink better than the reds too.
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Here they are, after the edgespot stamping:
So, at this point, I just need to get some light color edgespots stamped on my blue-black and chocolate fauxs (hopefully that will work). I will update my group photo when I get that done. Also, I will probably buy a few more fauxs, although I probably don't need them, and maybe add a few grays (for my cash set.)
I feel like I accomplished my goal of making a good quality, large tournament set as cheaply as possible. Of course projects always run over budget; but considering that I was able to find almost everything I needed either at Dollar Tree, or at a really low sale price (like the ink pads at half price), I'm not sure how much less anyone could have done this for.
What does the Faux Clay Nation think of these chips? They turned out much better than almost every other project I have attempted, thanks to everyone in the FCN who shared their advice and instructions here on C-T. I understand your enthusiasm for these chips now...they really are great chips, at any price.
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