New & Improved Image Transfer from Down Under

rodstan · May 21, 2008

Morning all,
After considerable time and expense on trying to transfer an image from my Canon ink jet and HP laser printers and using diferent brands of paper and transparencies etc that are readily available in Australia.,as a final desperate act to get something to actually work at all I raided the pantry and borrowed a roll of baking paper(used for lining cake tins and oven trays to make them non stick).It is a silicon(sic) coated paper and able to withstand oven temperatures to 450 C.It is pretty much transparent like tracing paper. Cost is about $3. for 15 metres from all good supermarkets and it goes on the grocery bill (non traceable).

To cut it short, I printed a design using the HP laser printer on a sheet cut to A4 dimensions and applied it to a steel plate coated with the Damar/Zippo solution which was just on tacky.Rubbed lightly with my finger and a flat agate burnisher (to make sure) and had 100% image transfer with no loss of fine detail and you could see the image coming off the paper as it went clear as the image lifted.Absolutely no laser toner left on the paper. The heat from the laser printer did a few wrinkles in the paper,but nothing significant. Total time from hitting the print button and coating the plate with Damar/Zippo varnish to a full image transfer was approx one minute!!
Made my day!!!!!!

Now to cut what I transferred.
See how you go,
Regards from land down under (Oz not NZ)
Rod

Michael McGrew · May 21, 2008

Who is the manufacture of the baking paper? Wonder what would be an equivalent here in the states? Any ideas from the forum?

rodstan · May 21, 2008

Coles home brand (think generic and cheap).Don't think it really matters it is not high tech stuff or meant for running through a laser printer. If it doesn't work it goes back in the pantry.
Rod

Roger Bleile · May 21, 2008

Rod,

I have a Cannon Pixama 4000 printer. Do you know if this process will work in your Cannon?

Roger

rodstan · May 21, 2008

Roger ,
mine is a Canon 460, just tried a print but it seems to have a few little globs of ink over the surface that are still wet.would need to dry off.See what happens later this morning. Nothing like the detail of the image from the laser printer which had fully bonded as it left the printer.The Canon image is three tones lighter,but should likely transfer as not much wants to stick to the paper (apart from cakes when getting them out of the baking tins as I recall).
Rod
Oz

Roger Bleile · May 21, 2008

Rod,

Thanks for checking.

Roger

msar24 · May 21, 2008

For those of you using a laser printer another trick is to not allow the heater in the printer to fuse the dry toner to the transparency film. I have seen threads on other forums that talk about disabling the heater but then the printer can't be used for printing regular prints (and you have to know exactly what you are doing). I found that If I cut the transparency film in half (across the width) the printer feeds it in and puts the toner on it, then jams. I pull the toner cartidge and the transparnecy film is there and easy to remove from the printer. Put the cartdige back in and close the cover and it's all ready to print again. Since the toner is not fused ot the transparency I get 100% transfer. But the drawback is that the toner is not fused and comes off easily. This may or may not work with all lasers.

One more transfer tip of the 10,000,000 already out there.

KCSteve · May 21, 2008

I believe the paper is known as 'baking parchment' here in the States.

Good Lord, it has it's own website

Michael McGrew · May 21, 2008

Thanks for the replies. Found some at "Hobby Lobby".

Another question though:

When you mix up the Zippo lighter fluid and the Damar varnish, do you only mix up enough for the current transfer, or can you mix up an ounce or two and store it?

rodstan · May 21, 2008

Tried it again this morning (been to bed in between), it wasn't a dream. Image transfer still works.There is no need to adjust print quality or turn off/ disable the fuser.Just hit the print button the same as printing any document.The image comes out "cured" and seems to be stable as it isn't powdery.
The Damar /Zippo mix started at 20/80 as set out in the Cirelli Method.I had problems with the tacked up varnish sticking to transparencies and the ink not releasing.None of these problems occur as the varnish doesn't adhere to the baking parchment.I mixed up the solution about 2 months or more ago and keep it in a little glass airtight jar.Would amount to a spoonfull in total as I reckon it has evaporated over time.
Down here baking parchment is available in a continuous 15 metre roll the same as cling wrap and is sold in the same section in the supermarket.
Never got as far as putting cling wrap in the laser printer!!(Joke).
Regards
Rod

Tira · May 21, 2008

rodstan, Thanks for posting your results. I have some parchment and will have to give it a try. It may solve a multitude of problems. Again, thanks for sharing your information with all of us in the cafe.

KCSteve · May 21, 2008

I tried to try it - the parchment I have is too flimsy and won't feed through my printer. Need to look for something a bit stiffer.

JCP · May 21, 2008

KCSteve, have you tried taping it to a sheet of printer paper?

Just a thought

GERALD K. MAJORS · May 21, 2008

Mixed Ratio

I Did Not Quite Understand Your Mixture Ratio. You Said 80/20 But Then In The Next Sentence
Stated You Had Trouble With It Being Too Tacky. So Did You Change The Mixture?
Thanks
Gerald

rodstan · May 21, 2008

Gerald,
Didn't change anything.Same level of almost dry/tacky surface stuck to every type of transparancy etc that I tried and pulled the damar off the plate. When dry nothing at all happened.When sticky I was left with a printed transparency coated with Damar and metal plate with very patchy varnish coating
With the baking parchment paper the sticky surface of the Damar did not adhere to the parchment surface and only the image was pulled of onto the plate.Ink jet printer inks do not adhere very well to the parchment surface and tend to ball up and stay wet.
Regards
Rod

KCSteve · May 22, 2008

JCP said:
KCSteve, have you tried taping it to a sheet of printer paper?

Just a thought

I thought about doing that but I'm saving it for a last resort - I worry that then it would be too heavy (as well as having the tape).

nomentalgiant · May 23, 2008

KCSteve said:
I thought about doing that but I'm saving it for a last resort - I worry that then it would be too heavy (as well as having the tape).

Taping the parchment paper to typing paper was my first thought as well, but you also might try this.
Fold the parchment paper in half and then feed the folded side into the printer first.
It may work or it just may jam your printer...........only one way to find out!

rodstan · May 23, 2008

Evening all,
More experimentation today,all transfers worked.
However got jams in the printer when the design got large ,plus a few randoms unless I guided the parchment into the rollers carefully.
Fixed problem by glueing the top leading edge of the parchment to an A4 sheet of normal printer paper using a glue stick. Results: a 3 X 4 fine detailed print of Don Quixote on horseback fully fused to surface with no jams. Perfect transfer on to brass.Bit too detailed to engrave as it is more tonal and is better suited to bulino shading.More experimentation to come.
I hope a glue stick is the same down here as overseas!!

It is just a craft paper glue in stick form in a wind out container (mine by Bostik).
Hope everone has the same success and that it isn't something caused by being in the Southern Hemisphere.
Regards to all,
Rod

KCSteve · May 23, 2008

That's it!

I was trying to think of the best way to bond the leading edge to the 'backing sheet' and for some reason using a glue stick never crossed my mind. Even if I don't find some of the stiffer parchment I'm sure the glue stick will work.

Now I just have to remember if I have one around the house or not...

KCSteve · May 28, 2008

Update:

Well, I finally remembered to grab a glue stick when I was at the store. Came home, glued the leading edge down to a sheet of regular paper and let 'er rip!

Turns out that this parchement, in my paper, doesn't pick up the image - I've got some faint ghosts of the heavier parts and that's about it.

On the plus side, it did feed nicely (so others having trouble: try this trick). And since I know from when it was jamming that the toner was transferring onto the paper in the imaging area (it's just not fusing) it's obvious I would get a complete transfer off of the paper.

<sigh> Back to looking for some 'better' parchement.

New & Improved Image Transfer from Down Under

Member

Member

Member

~ Elite 1000 Member ~

Member

~ Elite 1000 Member ~

Member

~ Elite 1000 Member ~

Member

Member

~ Elite 1000 Member ~

~ Elite 1000 Member ~

Member

Member

Member

~ Elite 1000 Member ~

Elite Cafe Member

Member

~ Elite 1000 Member ~

~ Elite 1000 Member ~

Sponsors