Removing red tones from dyed brown hair

[manderly]

Calaelen, thanks for clearing that up. You're probably right about the box dyes and the volume, I was exaggerating.

But would you agree that when one is only trying to deposit color in depleted hair and staying in the same color level that far less than 20 volume is needed or even recommended?

I never did salon dye jobs, I am a box hair dye kind of gal. I've always had success with it - until I was trying to dye back to my original brown and growing my hair out. The need to redye when the color faded (left me orange) and the harshness of 20 volume repeatedly wasn't helping me out at all. Once I switched to using professional dyes with 10 vol (or even 6) developer I got much better results that were actually (strangely) longer-lasting and faded more naturally with no orange like the old days.

I also just wanted to mention that I live in Hawaii, and have no access to anyplace that sells those products. I have purchased them online, most recently ebay. Another great thing about them is you can mix colors to customize your results

[Calaelen]

I definitely recommend using the lowest volume developer as needed for any colour job. Always.
Hmm, I never considered trying to buy colour online, professional or otherwise. I actually am laughing at myself at that one.
When you were trying to get back to your natural colour did you pick colours with a neutral tone in them, or an ash tone rather than say a golden? (sometimes this can be difficult to do)

Very often the problem with fading no matter what kind of colour or level of developer used is that natural hair has certain tones in it that are lifted up with the developer, so when hair fades they show up very clearly, whether it is an ash tone or a red tone. This can be very annoying, myself I have to deal with the red tone, and so I use neutral or ash shades to cancel it out.

The colour I originally recommended in this topic is the one that works best for my hair (of over the counter or cheaper ones) which is what the original poster asked for. I used to use professional stuff, but just got lucky to find an over the counter brand that is perfect for me.