Not sure if you've tried it yet, but paper from magazines work quite well with the toner transfer method. I've done a bunch of etched pcb's this way and there's next to no fibres that are left behind with a little experimentation. The supermarkets here have free recipe magazines with that glossy finish so I used to just grab those and run it through the laser printer.
Printing directly on aluminum possible with an ink jet printer? (+ some toner transfer experiments on aluminum)
- Thread starter rock soderstrom
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rock soderstrom
Tour de France
Hi Kman, thanks for feedback. Yes, I have tested a few types of paper with varying results. I've been doing this for a while, all my PCBs are made this way. I always come back to the paper described before, I get the best results with it. Fibers are no longer a problem, I am very satisfied.
Today the first heat resistant paint arrived, I'll see later if that gets me any further.
I will keep you informed.
Edit: grey heat resistant rattle can for 3,79€ @ action market.
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rock soderstrom
Tour de France
Have you tried silicone paper to make the transfer , its basically whats known as baking parchment , but theres a few other varieties also .
Its more or less non stick , and the paper fibers sticking in the paint wont be an issue ,
Standard white stick on labels often come on a roll of silicone paper , it makes the labels easy to peel off . Might be worth testing .
Theres a short demo of silicone release paper here ,
Im pretty sure the preservation sound badges you showed earlier are anodised ,
These type tags and face plates are also found on military gear , where you obviously cant have the legends scratch off , its very tough yet easy to replace if it does become damaged .
Its easy to clean as well , a quick wipe with isopropyl and its like new .
Its more or less non stick , and the paper fibers sticking in the paint wont be an issue ,
Standard white stick on labels often come on a roll of silicone paper , it makes the labels easy to peel off . Might be worth testing .
Theres a short demo of silicone release paper here ,
Im pretty sure the preservation sound badges you showed earlier are anodised ,
These type tags and face plates are also found on military gear , where you obviously cant have the legends scratch off , its very tough yet easy to replace if it does become damaged .
Its easy to clean as well , a quick wipe with isopropyl and its like new .
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rock soderstrom
Tour de France
Interesting, you are right. I got baking parchment here, I will test it. Another good (similiar) idea is to use the backer to Arlon Vinyl. I will give it a try, too.
Short update on heat resistant laquer. It stinks like hell and I think it smells pretty unhealthy. It doesnt stick at all, you have to burn it in over 1h with 160 degree Celsius. I do not want to use my kitchen oven because of the toxic fumes and the stink. I need some old table top oven, the story goes on...
Edit: That makes anodizing even more interesting. I'll have to watch some youtube videos on the subject.
Short update on heat resistant laquer. It stinks like hell and I think it smells pretty unhealthy. It doesnt stick at all, you have to burn it in over 1h with 160 degree Celsius. I do not want to use my kitchen oven because of the toxic fumes and the stink. I need some old table top oven, the story goes on...
Edit: That makes anodizing even more interesting. I'll have to watch some youtube videos on the subject.
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rock soderstrom-
I've done a ton of that stuff, but have mostly been off of it for ten or fifteen years. I wish I could remember enough to tell you something that might help, but you've probably already gone through a bunch of the same trial and error. I had it down to where I was getting consistently good results, mainly with PCBs, before I started with the aluminum, and had to run a lot of tests with the heat and pressure to get that working. The major screw-up point was a few years back when I finally broke down and upgraded my main computer. Up until then, I had been using ancient parallel port HP printers, but am now stuck with USB. Someone gave me a Brother printer, which I really like in all other regards, but apparently, their horrible reputation in the toner transfer world is well deserved. It's either the quality of the toner or the higher temperature required to melt theirs, but even the simplest PCB transfers take me several attempts to get anything usable, and even after that, it seems really easy to make it fall back off of the metal. I'd like to keep using it, and am thinking about maybe finding a third party refill toner that might work, but I'm not sure that's possible if the machine's heat is way off. I have one of the Apache laminators with the PIC chip mod that runs it back and forth a bunch of times, but usually end up just using the iron. I put an aluminum plate on that to help distribute the heat, but I get good results by really smashing down with the pressure focused on the tip for short periods while moving from spot to spot until the board is covered.
I started as you did, with positive black transfers, then spraying light coats of (I think) clear acrylic for protection, but have since moved to mostly etching as I was always worried about scratching through my labels. I guess the etched look isn't suitable for everything, but I usually like the results. It's also nice for the milling/drilling stage because you can put temporary layout markings and perfectly centered punch marks into the print to keep drill bits centered and such. I've done a few brass plates with it too (like the drum badge pictured). Aside from the thing in the middle of the left side, every metal thing pictured is etched. The top left one hadn't yet had any paint wiped into the etch though. I was meaning to try etches with different colors of paint in there, but never got around to it. The variac panel in the bottom left is the only thing pictured that was done with this new crap toner, and took several transfers despite being so basic.
One of the difficulties with it is that everything you don't want etched needs to be black, which is not only wasteful, but can lead to pinholes and such, and is harder to transfer. When I design my print, I'll usually draw white polygons in the larger black areas, and keep them a comfortable distance from the edges of the black area, so there's a big void in the space that the printer won't have to deal with. Afterward, I can either Sharpie or paint in the space to cover them before the etch. Oddly, I think the actual etching process was more trouble than the transfers. I've been through several concoctions, and ended up liking the 2 to 1 hydrogen peroxide/muriatic acid method the best for panels and PCBs, but the speed varies with temperature and the age of my ingredients, so I often end up over-etching while trying to assure that things are deep enough. It really doesn't need to be but a tiny little bit below the surface level to take the paint and show up right. The cool part I found is that if I do over-etch, I can often take the surface down just a tad lower with the final belt sander stage, and it shaves off all the fuzzy edges on the fonts, and the pinholes that happened during the tail end of the bath.
The thing in the middle right side you might find interesting. That's toner on 1/4" clear Lexan (Plexiglass). It took it surprisingly well. It doesn't look so good in the picture due to the shadows on the scanner cover and the fact that it's been tossed around with my scrap material in the workshop for fifteen years. Looking at those countersunk holes, I think I even used it as a base for a tool at some point. The two prints on that piece were the only times I did it, and it pretty much just worked. It really fuses into that stuff. I think the first one was slightly too hot and started to melt the plastic, so I backed the heat down on the second attempt. I was thinking of maybe doing an inverted print on the backside of the stuff (maybe with thinner plastic) so you'd have a protective layer of clear plastic over the labels.
Good luck with it, and please post here if you make any new findings. I'd love to get back to mine if I can straighten out the toner thing.
PS- One final bit I remembered regarding the paper, was that there was a cheap yellow paper from China that everybody was getting which worked really well. It looks about like a yellow version of the glossy photo paper and unfortunately came tightly wrapped in a roll. I'd imagine it's still around if you search for "yellow China paper for toner transfers", but I haven't needed to get any more since you get about a million sheets for a few dollars.
PS2- That layout in the first few posts looks really good considering the surface area. Getting consistent heat and pressure across a large area was not easy for me. Congratulations!
I've done a ton of that stuff, but have mostly been off of it for ten or fifteen years. I wish I could remember enough to tell you something that might help, but you've probably already gone through a bunch of the same trial and error. I had it down to where I was getting consistently good results, mainly with PCBs, before I started with the aluminum, and had to run a lot of tests with the heat and pressure to get that working. The major screw-up point was a few years back when I finally broke down and upgraded my main computer. Up until then, I had been using ancient parallel port HP printers, but am now stuck with USB. Someone gave me a Brother printer, which I really like in all other regards, but apparently, their horrible reputation in the toner transfer world is well deserved. It's either the quality of the toner or the higher temperature required to melt theirs, but even the simplest PCB transfers take me several attempts to get anything usable, and even after that, it seems really easy to make it fall back off of the metal. I'd like to keep using it, and am thinking about maybe finding a third party refill toner that might work, but I'm not sure that's possible if the machine's heat is way off. I have one of the Apache laminators with the PIC chip mod that runs it back and forth a bunch of times, but usually end up just using the iron. I put an aluminum plate on that to help distribute the heat, but I get good results by really smashing down with the pressure focused on the tip for short periods while moving from spot to spot until the board is covered.
I started as you did, with positive black transfers, then spraying light coats of (I think) clear acrylic for protection, but have since moved to mostly etching as I was always worried about scratching through my labels. I guess the etched look isn't suitable for everything, but I usually like the results. It's also nice for the milling/drilling stage because you can put temporary layout markings and perfectly centered punch marks into the print to keep drill bits centered and such. I've done a few brass plates with it too (like the drum badge pictured). Aside from the thing in the middle of the left side, every metal thing pictured is etched. The top left one hadn't yet had any paint wiped into the etch though. I was meaning to try etches with different colors of paint in there, but never got around to it. The variac panel in the bottom left is the only thing pictured that was done with this new crap toner, and took several transfers despite being so basic.
One of the difficulties with it is that everything you don't want etched needs to be black, which is not only wasteful, but can lead to pinholes and such, and is harder to transfer. When I design my print, I'll usually draw white polygons in the larger black areas, and keep them a comfortable distance from the edges of the black area, so there's a big void in the space that the printer won't have to deal with. Afterward, I can either Sharpie or paint in the space to cover them before the etch. Oddly, I think the actual etching process was more trouble than the transfers. I've been through several concoctions, and ended up liking the 2 to 1 hydrogen peroxide/muriatic acid method the best for panels and PCBs, but the speed varies with temperature and the age of my ingredients, so I often end up over-etching while trying to assure that things are deep enough. It really doesn't need to be but a tiny little bit below the surface level to take the paint and show up right. The cool part I found is that if I do over-etch, I can often take the surface down just a tad lower with the final belt sander stage, and it shaves off all the fuzzy edges on the fonts, and the pinholes that happened during the tail end of the bath.
The thing in the middle right side you might find interesting. That's toner on 1/4" clear Lexan (Plexiglass). It took it surprisingly well. It doesn't look so good in the picture due to the shadows on the scanner cover and the fact that it's been tossed around with my scrap material in the workshop for fifteen years. Looking at those countersunk holes, I think I even used it as a base for a tool at some point. The two prints on that piece were the only times I did it, and it pretty much just worked. It really fuses into that stuff. I think the first one was slightly too hot and started to melt the plastic, so I backed the heat down on the second attempt. I was thinking of maybe doing an inverted print on the backside of the stuff (maybe with thinner plastic) so you'd have a protective layer of clear plastic over the labels.
Good luck with it, and please post here if you make any new findings. I'd love to get back to mine if I can straighten out the toner thing.
PS- One final bit I remembered regarding the paper, was that there was a cheap yellow paper from China that everybody was getting which worked really well. It looks about like a yellow version of the glossy photo paper and unfortunately came tightly wrapped in a roll. I'd imagine it's still around if you search for "yellow China paper for toner transfers", but I haven't needed to get any more since you get about a million sheets for a few dollars.
PS2- That layout in the first few posts looks really good considering the surface area. Getting consistent heat and pressure across a large area was not easy for me. Congratulations!
Attachments
rock soderstrom
Tour de France
Hey Jidis, thank you for your experience! Your results look good 
, I also find etching very interesting and enjoy doing it. It always makes me feel a bit like a wizard.
, I also find etching very interesting and enjoy doing it. It always makes me feel a bit like a wizard.That is also my career. I first started with PCBs and then transferred my extensive experience to aluminium. It works quite well now, I will start a new project at the weekend and post my results here.
Yes, that is dangerous. Never change a winning team (unfortunately you had to). I have been working with a very basic Samsung ML 2525 and the original toner for quite some time. Once I tried a third-party product, it ended in a disaster. I now use only the original toner again together with my aforementioned photo paper. I also buy every original toner available for my printer out of fear that it will soon be out of stock. The toner now costs regular more than the printer did when it was new!
As I said, I am also very interested in etching. It's true that you need a good strategy to minimise the need for toner, because in this process you have to cover everything you don't want to etch.
Interesting, I am curious how my first attempts will turn out! I will first start again with iron III chloride. But I think I need something with more bang to etch aluminium. Thanks for the "hydrogen peroxide/muriatic acid method" tip!
Thanks! I will post my upcoming results here. Stay tuned. Good luck!
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rock soderstrom
Tour de France
Here is a video on the subject of etching small parts.
The guy is really serious and has some good ideas, even if the result might not have been that good.
The guy is really serious and has some good ideas, even if the result might not have been that good.
Hey rock soderstrom,
The behavior of that acid mix is generally pretty predictable, and it can etch rather fast with its own heat, though I did have one occasion early on, which I believe was with aluminum, where it went nuts when the metal went in, and started foaming and bubbling violently. I had to quickly jump away from it until it calmed down. Fortunately, it was sitting on a big plastic outdoor trash bin. I'm thinking maybe it was the heat outdoors, but I believe the acid does age in some way, so it may have been a brand new jug. I could usually add a bit of one of the ingredients, or maybe a pinch of salt, if it had gotten too weak. Just make sure to do a small test piece (outdoors) in a nice open spot with the usual emergency junk (goggles,gloves,baking soda,water). The totally invisible fumes from that acid will knock you on your tail if you get anywhere near them, so be careful there as well. I'm not positive, but I think it may even have rusted some things in my shop which were near the closed jug, so I now keep it outside and far from any metals.
I started with ferric chloride, moved to sodium persulfate crystals, then ended on the muriatic mix. It seems to do all of the metals I've needed it for, and is obviously quite cheap. They made me buy way too much of it at the home improvement place here, and it still barely cost anything. I also had made a really nice tall, flat etch tank with a heater and bubblers back in my sodium persulfate days and don't even bother with it now.
I'll keep that Samsung in mind if I give up on this Brother one. I think I remember people even having good results with certain brands only when they did use cheap third party toner carts, so I guess as you said, it's a matter of finding the right combo and sticking with it (and hoping nobody changes suppliers or formulations).
Let me know if you ever try that plastic or anything else. I've been too lazy to do it again. I'd also be interested in the color toner thing, but with as much of a crapshoot as the black seems to be, I'm not sure I'd even take a chance on buying a color laser unless I knew for certain that I was getting the same model and toner someone else was using. That green TRF foil worked really well with the previous HP printer, but it doesn't even pretend to stick to the Brother stuff. I also had white back then, but never got that to stick.
This attached image shows the drill hole punch marks I was talking about. The etching to me is worth it for that alone. I still haven't gotten my metal skills down to where I get 100% on-target holes without those. I also kind of like that rustic look you get from the texture in larger etched spaces when I've done inverted un-etched labels surrounded by black, like in that "test test" thing in the center of the other picture.
Take Care
The behavior of that acid mix is generally pretty predictable, and it can etch rather fast with its own heat, though I did have one occasion early on, which I believe was with aluminum, where it went nuts when the metal went in, and started foaming and bubbling violently. I had to quickly jump away from it until it calmed down. Fortunately, it was sitting on a big plastic outdoor trash bin. I'm thinking maybe it was the heat outdoors, but I believe the acid does age in some way, so it may have been a brand new jug. I could usually add a bit of one of the ingredients, or maybe a pinch of salt, if it had gotten too weak. Just make sure to do a small test piece (outdoors) in a nice open spot with the usual emergency junk (goggles,gloves,baking soda,water). The totally invisible fumes from that acid will knock you on your tail if you get anywhere near them, so be careful there as well. I'm not positive, but I think it may even have rusted some things in my shop which were near the closed jug, so I now keep it outside and far from any metals.
I started with ferric chloride, moved to sodium persulfate crystals, then ended on the muriatic mix. It seems to do all of the metals I've needed it for, and is obviously quite cheap. They made me buy way too much of it at the home improvement place here, and it still barely cost anything. I also had made a really nice tall, flat etch tank with a heater and bubblers back in my sodium persulfate days and don't even bother with it now.
I'll keep that Samsung in mind if I give up on this Brother one. I think I remember people even having good results with certain brands only when they did use cheap third party toner carts, so I guess as you said, it's a matter of finding the right combo and sticking with it (and hoping nobody changes suppliers or formulations).
Let me know if you ever try that plastic or anything else. I've been too lazy to do it again. I'd also be interested in the color toner thing, but with as much of a crapshoot as the black seems to be, I'm not sure I'd even take a chance on buying a color laser unless I knew for certain that I was getting the same model and toner someone else was using. That green TRF foil worked really well with the previous HP printer, but it doesn't even pretend to stick to the Brother stuff. I also had white back then, but never got that to stick.
This attached image shows the drill hole punch marks I was talking about. The etching to me is worth it for that alone. I still haven't gotten my metal skills down to where I get 100% on-target holes without those. I also kind of like that rustic look you get from the texture in larger etched spaces when I've done inverted un-etched labels surrounded by black, like in that "test test" thing in the center of the other picture.
Take Care
Attachments
rock soderstrom
Tour de France
A small update: in addition to front panels, I also use the toner transfer method to print my self-etched PCBs now!
Keep in mind (black) toner is carbon. If it starts spreading inside your device, it might pose a problem. It will come loose if the pcb gets hot.
I'm not sure what colour toners are made of. Mostly plastics, these days, I presume. Could be less of a problem?
I'm not sure what colour toners are made of. Mostly plastics, these days, I presume. Could be less of a problem?
rock soderstrom
Tour de France
Could be a problem but I always fix it with a layer of clear varnish. That makes the print durable and the toner/carbon will not travel to my chassis.
