No. of parts for Pantone Warm Grey 9 ?

You can convert to parts very easily. Decide how many parts you want to end up with in total, and then multiply the percentages you have, by that number. For instance, say you decide you want to end up with a formula made up of 10 parts in total. I don’t have a PMS book in front of me so this is not accurate to make your color, but say for the sake of illustration that warm gray 9 is 5% orange, 10% black and 85% white. For the orange, if you multiply 5% (.05) x 10 parts total, you would get .5 or 1/2 part orange. For the black, 10% (.10) x 10 parts is 1 part black. For the white, 85% (.85) x 10 parts gives you 8 1/2 parts white. So there is the percentage formula expressed as parts.

Thank you very much Geoffrey— I was hoping there was a mathematical solution.

Sylvia, from personal experience (the expensive kind) when dealing with the pantone grays it’s always less of a headache time and dollar wise to have your ink supplier make it. Their measuring capabilities are made for this. Try MixMasters Lynn MA
Ted Lavin
Artificer Press

Pure conjecture (and probably from the wrong orifice!) but would it be worth a little research into how the *Big Boys* do it when they HAVE TO mix or match specific colours.???

I.E with highly accurate, DIGITAL Beam scales, even way back, the reasonably well versed *Minders* would/did use Analogue Beam scales. and info from the Ink Manufacturers own colour guides, charts, for the starting weights and proportions, and then the Final Dab Test on the stock to be printed, preferably viewed under normal daylight, rather than artificial.?

Of course way back in the slightly bigger production houses, there would have been a Densitometer (usually GRETAG in U.K.) lurking in the corner of the press room, for use against the Progressive Proofs… . E bay is littered with modern counterparts.

Good Luck, & Apologies if this be a Red Herring.!!…but may provoke more and better input.

I can’t resist following up on Mick’s comment. An accurate scale, math and the Ink Manufacturers chart are the tools to start with. Most small printer will not even use a couple of ounces of ink for a small job.

If you use “parts”, how are you measuring it.

If you use a scale and you want 2 ounces use the math formula from the Pantone book: 85% of 2 ounces of PMS Trans. White (some will add Opaque white) [1.7 oz], 1.28% of 2 ounces of PMS 032 Red [.0256 oz] and 13.72% of 2 ounces of PMS Black [.2744 oz]. Mix it all thoroughly with an ink knife and you have 2 ounces of PMS Warm Gray 9.

You don’t get it. Very small discrepancies in your measurements make a big difference in the outcome of your mix. More so when trying to do less than a lb.
I’ve been mixing inks pre pantone and in conferring with a friend who’s an ink chemist told me that with these gray formulas an ink maker would go back to the base color formulas and work from there to have more control.
Ted Lavin
Artificer Press

Just wanted to come back and say that I followed Geoffrey’s formula, based on 20 parts, and converted the parts to grams which I measured on a scale. The color turned out perfectly; I’ve actually mixed it twice now and it was consistent both times.

Thanks so much for getting back to us Sylvia, and letting us know how things turned out. Glad we could be of help :)