8 replies to this topic

[macbruce]

A pal of mine just turned me on to this process whereby you can transfer a copied image onto a piece clean,smooth metal. It's very handy for laying out images onto your workpiece for reposse type layouts or in my case for Zipmax work.....
First, your copies can not be made on a bubble jet printer, it must be a laser printer that only uses black toner. I had to go to Staples to do mine.
Second, clean the metal, tape the image FACE DOWN on the metal pour on some acetone, rub the paper with a clean cloth or paper towel firmly till the acetone all evaporates and bada bing! The toner ink transfers to the metal and is very tough, you have to rub it hard with Scotch Brite to remove it. Clear, bold lines work the best but as in the case of the face image you can toutch it up if the lines aren't crisp enough.... In the case of images like faces and such, program the copier to reverse the image if need be so it appears correctly.

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[AvishaiW]

Thats cool. Thanks for sharing. I am going to try it first thing tommorrow.

[KST1]

Neat process.

My buddy has used a somewhat similar technique for woodcarving. He uses copies from an office copier ( heat transfer toner ), puts them ink down on the wood, and then runs an iron (like for ironing clothes) over the paper. The heat from the iron transfers the image over to the wood.

I've never tried it on steel, gonna have to do try it.

Thanks for sharing.

-Derek

[Matt Weber]

Yeah its all in the toner. Apparently there are two main types, graphite based and plastic type based. The plastic type (Canon I know of) will melt the image on when heat is applied but the paper type is important. Shiny magazine type paper (Mohawk brand) works really well and so does the kodak picture paper. They transfer a cleaner image than regular paper. Acetone will dissolve the plastic and transfer as well.

Most of the graphite toners will just transfer a smeary image if they work at all.

[crquack]

Brother printers do not work for this. I use HP.

[Pat Roy]

CRQuack, are you saying this process works with HP toners? Or HP laser printers?

[crquack]

All I am saying is that I use an HP laser printer with an HP cartridge.

[knots43]

What crquack says is supported by this quote from the Brother site:

"Toner particles must be heated above their melting point in order for them to flow onto the paper, cool and become solid. Each Brother laser product is designed to reach a pre-set heating temperature based on the original Brother toner formula. The preset temperature varies from model to model, due to the product design specifications."

So, it appears that the iron on process would be the route if brother copies are used. I just replaced a long depleted toner cartridge in my brother machine and will give it a try. Thanks to all for this useful information.

[crquack]

I should say that I find the iron-on method poor. It is OK for thin materials but I defy you to transfer onto a 1/4" steel :-) I made myself a heat transfer press and can control the temperature fairly precisely and pressure not so precisely. However, my results with Press-n-Peel have improved several-fold. It is still tricky, particularly with larger areas of transfer.