setting the color in a Gi

[ShoriKid]

Question for the karate forums crew. For those who wear color gi, when you did your first wash did you pre-soak it in vinegar? I've had a couple of black gi in the past and it wasn't an issue. But, I just got a new Break Point jj gi and it's a sharp blue that I'd hate to see fade. So, to those vinegar soak, did it help with color fade? Those who didn't, can you see much color lose?

[JohnASE]

It's hard to get a good answer to this question. Color fade is going to vary from brand to brand and model to model. Sometimes, this even happens within a model.

We've had customers tell us vinegar works, and we've told other customers about it, but we've never done comparisons. I can't say for sure that it works or to what degree, but I don't remember anyone telling us that they tried it and it didn't work.

Oh, and our experiences are only with black karate gi. For your specific gi, you might want to contact your vendor or the manufacturer.

[ShoriKid]

Part of the care instructions with the gi said to soak in vinegar. So did the last black karate gi I got. Didn't soak it and can't see a difference in the fade though. So I'm up in the air on it. PittbullJudoka and I were talking about this and wondered if anyone was going to jump and make the first post. We're both in the middle on the vinegar issue.