Thursday, February 10, 2011

Reroot Doll Hair: Make a Reroot Tool

Make your own Cheapo Reroot Tool...
Doll hair cannot regrow, but it can be rerooted! One of my recent tutorials covered the knot method, a painfully slow way of rerooting doll hair. Using a reroot tool is more efficient, and takes less than half the time the knot method takes. However, to use it you need a reroot tool! Many sites sell excellent metal tools, notably Dolly Hair. These are worth the money... but what if you’re broke?

Simple— make a Cheapo Reroot Tool! This sturdy metal tool can swap out broken needles and doubles as a hair-hole puncher!

You Will Need:
• Exacto knife (one without a rotating blade)
• embroidery sewing needle (size 7, 8 or 10)
• Wire Cutter
• Pliers (optional)

1. Unscrew your exacto knife, removing the blade from the handle.








2. Place the needle inside the handle, with the eye facing up (the pointy end should be inside the tool.) Use pliers to tighten the needle into the exacto blade handle.

3. Clip the eye of your needle with the wire cutter, leaving a pitch-fork shape behind. Try to clip at an angle, so one prong is longer than the other (this helps the needle sink into the scalp more efficiently)





4. Now you have your very own a reroot tool. To use it as a whole puncher, simply unscrew the exacto blade handle and turn the needle around, so its pointy side faces up. If the needle is too long to comfortably slide it into the head, clip the pointy side off using the wire cutter. Now check out my reroot tool tutorial!

6 comments:

  1. Thanks for sharing how to make a rerooting tool. I'm just dipping my feet into the doll customizing waters and I appreciate all the help I can get!
    I recently started collecting Bratz dolls from thrift stores and your restoration ideas are very helpful. There are a lot of old Dylan dolls out there ( I have 5 now) - I feel like I have a clone army! Rerooting and dying are in their future :-)

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  2. Hello! I have made my reroot tool and I used to rerooting my Sindy's doll hair. Thank's for your idea!

    Bambuc from Hungary

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  3. Here are my photos about rerooting

    http://www.flickr.com/photos/bambuc/5615659623/in/photostream

    So, it isn't perfect, but it was my first attempt.

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  4. I'm not a fan of the punch method because it can be undone without glue, but I do love how you invented a homemade version of the hair punch tool. I created one out of a needle and pencil, but this one looks so much sleeker.

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  5. THANK YOU for this tutorial! I live in the country and have a rural route address. Every time I try to order re-root supplies, they tell me at the end when I'm entering my shipping address that they don't ship to P.O. boxes. I don't live at an address with a p.o. box, it's a rural route address but they don't get it.
    You have solved my problem and my hat is off to you!
    Excellent tutorial!

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  6. I've been reading anything I can about customizing dolls, this recent MH trend has me craving to do one myself. I wanted to thank you for this tutorial. It only took 3$ to make my own re-root tool. You're a true artist for wanting to share your knowledge. Have a great day. :]

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