mescarcega
New member
I've gone down the Milk Dud rabbit hole longer than I care to admit. I just can't help myself, and even the Milkduds I make feel better than many big-name layered tips. The thought of soaking tips in milk is still jarring, and when getting funny looks at the pool hall talking about it, I decided it was time to find an alternative to milk.
To my knowledge, a Milkdud is a single-layered leather tip that absorbs the casein (a protein) in milk that closes any voids in the leather. In this way, the tip is consistent. Layered tips were created to combat the inconsistencies in single layer tip. Regardless, casein is the common denominator in Milk Dud creation, not milk itself.
So I ordered powdered casein, which is used to created pain and pigments and tried to mix it in water. No luck! The casein remained clumped up. However, early tests did produce tips that swelled similarly to traditional Milk Duds. I tried microwaving the solution slowly to dissolve the casein. The casein did not dissolve much more, but if you overheat the solution, the casein rubberizes.
The trick to dissolving casein is to make the solvent more basic. I used baking soda, and lo and behold the casein as mostly dissolved in the solution. Since casein has a low solubility in water, you can only disoolve so little. However, the basic solution allows the protein bonds to unfold and the casein to disolve. The result is a super-saturated casein solution that I found can be used many times before the casein is depleted.
The new solution swells the tips very well. In 12 hours, the tips swell to a height that soaking a tip in milk for 3 days achieved. I also found that the tips rise more uniformly. Before, the tips would have an uneven dome. Now, they are uniform.
Anyways, Here is the general factored-down recipe I use:
-10 g of water
-1 g of casein
-3 g of baking soda
Casein is pretty cheap, a 100 g bag cost me $10 and baking soda is fairly ubiquitous in many kitchens. I may eperiment with a vacuum pump to impregnate the tips with the solution better.
To my knowledge, a Milkdud is a single-layered leather tip that absorbs the casein (a protein) in milk that closes any voids in the leather. In this way, the tip is consistent. Layered tips were created to combat the inconsistencies in single layer tip. Regardless, casein is the common denominator in Milk Dud creation, not milk itself.
So I ordered powdered casein, which is used to created pain and pigments and tried to mix it in water. No luck! The casein remained clumped up. However, early tests did produce tips that swelled similarly to traditional Milk Duds. I tried microwaving the solution slowly to dissolve the casein. The casein did not dissolve much more, but if you overheat the solution, the casein rubberizes.
The trick to dissolving casein is to make the solvent more basic. I used baking soda, and lo and behold the casein as mostly dissolved in the solution. Since casein has a low solubility in water, you can only disoolve so little. However, the basic solution allows the protein bonds to unfold and the casein to disolve. The result is a super-saturated casein solution that I found can be used many times before the casein is depleted.
The new solution swells the tips very well. In 12 hours, the tips swell to a height that soaking a tip in milk for 3 days achieved. I also found that the tips rise more uniformly. Before, the tips would have an uneven dome. Now, they are uniform.
Anyways, Here is the general factored-down recipe I use:
-10 g of water
-1 g of casein
-3 g of baking soda
Casein is pretty cheap, a 100 g bag cost me $10 and baking soda is fairly ubiquitous in many kitchens. I may eperiment with a vacuum pump to impregnate the tips with the solution better.
