Extending my dreads...how much hair will i need???

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girl on fire
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Extending my dreads...how much hair will i need???

Post by girl on fire » Mon May 09, 2011 2:02 pm

Hello there!

I really want to extend my year old dreads as i am starting to get frustrated at the slow rate of growth. I am going to use human hair but have got no idea how much to buy.....its like a whole new world. I have approx 62 dreads in my hair but they are pretty thin ones....a few are about 1cm thick and the rest are smaller....some of them are tiny, but i wont extend those as i know it wont work!

I have found a website that sells human hair in 50gm bundles....but its about aus$100 per bundle. The length of the hair in the bundle is 20inches so i thought i could cut it in half and get twice as much hair from it....do you think that this would be enough to do my whole head?

I know its difficult to judge without seeing a picture, so i have uploaded three of the best ones of my hair i could find in the hope that this will help.

Thanks in advance for the advice!
peas and hugs x

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Image
Image
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kaytedies
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Re: Extending my dreads...how much hair will i need???

Post by kaytedies » Wed May 11, 2011 2:45 am

I bought a pack of human weft hair (it was human, but not enough because I wasn't able to bleach or dye it at all :p) from one of the hair shops out my way. I wanna say I used a decent amount of the bag, if not all of it- and I had 40 dreads. I wanna say the weft hair was 14-16 inches- I honestly can't recall. After I cut out the extenders and brushed my dreads out (*sob*) I kept the extenders haha. They still live in my dresser ;D
Mine I believe were around your thickess, I also had less dreads because I have the side of my head shaved a bit.

I had my dreads for about 2 months before I extended them...but that's only because I was lazy while making the extenders :p

PRE Extenders:
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Post Extenders:
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rivetlicker_
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Re: Extending my dreads...how much hair will i need???

Post by rivetlicker_ » Wed May 11, 2011 6:32 am

ECW by Black & Gold is a very affordable and decent weft to use for extending. You get way more than 100g I'm sure. A pack of 18" long hair will cost you about $65 including shipping to Australia. You just need to create the dread and snip off the weave part, then crochet.
It is explained here:
http://hairextensionsforum.com/viewtopi ... 62&t=10569
http://hairextensionsforum.com/viewtopi ... 62&t=10571

EDIT, forgot to add, you can get it from ikickshins.net

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Aricyn
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Re: Extending my dreads...how much hair will i need???

Post by Aricyn » Wed May 11, 2011 10:39 am

i dont have any advice but wow kay your dreads are freaking awesome
<3

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girl on fire
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Re: Extending my dreads...how much hair will i need???

Post by girl on fire » Wed May 11, 2011 12:46 pm

Thanks for the advice and compliments. I will post pictures of my new extended dreads when they are done...i think its gonna take a while!

;)
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girl on fire
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Re: Extending my dreads...how much hair will i need???

Post by girl on fire » Wed May 11, 2011 1:09 pm

I just ordered my hair and paid extra for express shipping, i am so impatient! really excited, thanks again for the advice and the website link, it was still cheaper than the site i was looking at and had way more colour choice...its been added to my favourites :i2:
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Anouk_Dreadmaker
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Re: Extending my dreads...how much hair will i need???

Post by Anouk_Dreadmaker » Thu May 19, 2011 9:20 pm

well...
the simplest method is to buy someone elses' dreads and extend your own that way. if it's well done noone will ever know extension was made, of course you can match colors or dye&color hair after extending them. example:
before (with synthetic dreads endings)
Image
and after:
Image

the second way and the cheapest one is to collect hair from your barber, loose hair longer than 10 cm, and we'll need really huge amount of them but you can get them for free... or you can buy natural hair cut off to make wigs, but those unprepared, from one's head.
of course you can buy prepared human hair in packs but you will need many of them and it's the most expensive method, i guess.

third way is to extend natural dreads with synthetic crocheted dreads, if colour matches you won't divide them from natural ones! light, no maintenance needed, quickly dry.
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Image

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trippytroll
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Re: Extending my dreads...how much hair will i need???

Post by trippytroll » Thu May 19, 2011 9:31 pm

if you extend with synth hair though, your more than likely to get a different texture as synth has a shine to it
sophie
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Gracey
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Re: Extending my dreads...how much hair will i need???

Post by Gracey » Fri May 20, 2011 7:19 pm

Also, synth does tarnish over time. To extend natural dreads, I always use human hair so that it can be dyed, washed and treated just as the natural hair.
What, that? It's a spade.

Gracey xx
Formerly known as Woolhairhabbit

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LonelyAngel
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Re: Extending my dreads...how much hair will i need???

Post by LonelyAngel » Sun May 29, 2011 11:01 pm

Well what I've done is dread my own hair (it's about 5 inches long) then I bought a pack of Human hair weft from an Afro Caribbean shop we have near me, luckily it was auburn which is near my hair colour :) I did dye my hair to match perfectly though ;)

Then I followed a couple of tutorials on YouTube to make dreads and sewed them onto my own dreads and crocheted the ends in. It took forever :o I took over a week do it fully but it was worth it. I just held the ones I hadn't done yet in place with elastic bands till I got round to doing them all. That also helped with placement.

With hair dye, human hair, crochet hook and cotton its cost me about £40 but about 4 weeks of work (and sore hands) :lol:
I may never be a tall blonde-haired beauty but what's wrong with a short dread-headed cutie?

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girl on fire
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Re: Extending my dreads...how much hair will i need???

Post by girl on fire » Wed Jun 01, 2011 12:52 pm

thanks for all the advice, i bought some hair and have completed my extensions....what a mission! will post some pics asap. I used human hair as i am a fire performer and synthetic dreads would not mix with fire very well at all...it would just melt to my head most probably....not a good look tee hee! :D
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Anouk_Dreadmaker
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Re: Extending my dreads...how much hair will i need???

Post by Anouk_Dreadmaker » Sat Mar 30, 2013 8:42 am

http://sphotos-d.ak.fbcdn.net/hphotos-a ... 1538_n.jpg
upper dreads: brand new
lower: 3,5 years old dreads, just a bit rubbed off

shining depends on kanekalon you use and it's generally visible only with flash on

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