Purple Heart or Purple Dye??

I'm not familiar with that particular Sweets kendama. The only Prime shaped Purpleheart ken of which I'm aware is the v10 Splatter Raptor and I think they are/were available as kens only. Is that a mystery dama?

 

Ah, ok. Well a few things could be going on but it seems unlikely that Sweets is knowingly "sellin spoofs." Just some thoughts off the top of my head 1. the string had some kind of chemical reaction with the wood. From what I've read and seen purpleheart can be a bit sappy so maybe it didn't play nice with the satin (?) string. 2. It's always hard to judge from a photo since they don't always look like they do in real life but that purple appears to be pretty vivid compared to the wood I've seen so it *might* have been tweaked by the manufacturer overseas for 'better' color. I don't really know the Sweets QC process but at the volumes they turn I'd be surprised if every piece is inspected and even if it was seen they might not have noticed anything was odd about it.

Like I mentioned these are just things that could perhaps be happening. If you think it's dyed then see if you can rub color off with a tissue. I don't have a piece of purpleheart handy but I don't recall it losing its color by rubbing. It will get darker with hand oils over time however. If you aren't happy with it then by all means contact Sweets directly.

 

The other answers in this thread are incorrect, here's what this is about:

When you first cut into purpleheart, it is not very purple. It is a sort of brownish-purple, and will remain that way until exposed to light (UV wavelength specifically, iirc). Exposure to light causes a chemical reaction that creates the purple colour, so in this case, the kendama was probably strung soon after being turned, and then the string blocked the light from hitting the wood in that one area. After some play / wrapping the string up differently, the previously-unexposed wood will react with light and turn purple.

In the long term, purpleheart slowly loses it's colour again, returning to a more brown colour. Some purpleheart products will be sealed with a UV-proof sealant to help lock the colour in (the reaction that causes the colour to degrade is light-catalyzed as well). This can take years though, which may often be longer than the life of a kendama (and hand oil/grit will often darken and help 'protect' a dama as well, to some extent at least).

 

If I understand correctly Prime kens (and kendama) are sourced overseas. This probably means that the time between when it was turned and then finally received by the customer is going to be measured in months at least if shipped by sea. If it only takes a short time for the initial change in color to occur, days to weeks for example, and it was not received with a string wrapped in that location and/or didn't have discoloration when it was first received then I'm a bit confused. Would wrapping string around it after receiving it in good condition make the color revert to its original brownish color then change again to purple when exposed to UV? In other words can the color change back and forth just by being covered up?

Wood Database photo

 

Exposure to sunlight is needed, so if the kendama was produced indoors, and then soon after placed into a box or otherwise covered up, it could be shipped prior to fully changing colour. Wrapping the string around it wouldn't cause it to revert, in this case it appears that the ken was not continuously exposed to light until after the string was wrapped around it. The string may have been wrapped at the factory, or maybe in the Sweets shop, but one way or another the ken probably just lived in a box until the string was put on.

I've seen this with basically every purpleheart dama we've made over the last 5-6 years. I remember with the LBBs in particular, we had them stored in an open-top box while we were prepping them for release. By the time we sold them, the kendamas at the top of the box were much more purple than the ones at the bottom of the box. (eventually they'd all event out, the ones at the bottom just need some time in the light.

The wood database colour-scale photo you linked is actually really spot-on, based on my experience. Only change I would make to it is to make the far left of the scale even less purple, and more brown-ish.

 

@htimSxelA I think my confusion comes from the implied on again off again nature of the mark. Maybe it's just the way I'm reading it but it appears that there was no mark when received, then acquired a mark after being wrapped with string, followed by having the mark disappear again.

Not sure if this is the actual turn of events (maybe @Tortilla_gorilla could chime in) but follow me on this and see if it fits with what you have seen. Ken is cut, boxed quickly before fully changed, customer opens sees no mark, wraps string and leaves it exposed to UV for some period (string blocks UV). The rest of the ken partially changes color then when unwrapped the mark appears. It's exposed to UV again this time without the string wrapped and the mark changes color to match the rest of the ken. Does that track?

The Wood Database is one of my favorite haunts when I'm looking for info on various woods; great resource.