Printing transfers - inkjet printer

[MikeQ]

Hello

 

ive had some success printing water slide transfers in a black and white laser printer, onto laser transfer sheets of course 😀.

 

Anyone printed colour transfer, onto colour inkjet transfer sheets with any luck?  Its nearly 20 years since I had an inkjet printer for home use and it was a pain in the a**.  The colour cartridges always drying/clogging up if you didn’t use them regularly.

Is that still the same or hopefully technology has moved on?

 

I know there are limitations like you can’t print white but can’t have everything.

 

Any feedback appreciated.

 

Mike

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

[Martin Harris - Moderator]

Not for some years but I was pleased with the ones I produced on my inkjet printer.  The only ones I still have, which are on my 20 year old Chipmunk, are black print rather than colour but they have survived well, resisting fading under their coating of polyeurathane varnish.

 

My current printer has high capacity tanks rather than cartridges but I've only had it for a year or so.  Previous ones have all suffered from short cartridge life.

[Nigel Heather]

I believe that inkjet would be the best way to go - my experience with colour lasers, including the cheaper one I have at home and big expensive ones at work, is that they can't reproduce colours as accurately as inkjet nor with the same vibrancy.

 

I know what you mean about the print heads clogging though.  I have two printers at home, a colour laser and an inkjet.  Mostly use the laser, the inkjet is for projects where I need good colour printing, photos, artwork etc.  But I use the inkjet so infrequently, I have to spend time and ink to unblock the nozzles every time I attempt to use it.

 

Inkjets are best if you use them regularly.

Edited November 1, 2023 by Nigel Heather

[Frank Skilbeck]

Yes I've done this, the transfers themselves are fine, but effect on the model will depend on the colour of the underlying surface as it will show through and so what looks great off the printer can disappoint on the model. I put some on a yellow model and they look great, no so good on a dark red model though. 

[Allan Bennett]

I've had good results with inkjet waterslide transfers.  The transparency of some papers will become white if you spray them with a certain type of varnish after printing.  I spray with Humbrol varnish anyway, and let dry before soaking and sliding.  You can, of course, also print onto printable white vinyl instead.

 

My printer is often unused for a couple of months, but I've never had any problem with clogged cartridges.  Are you guys using the manufacturers' originals, or 3rd-party cartridges?

 

 

[leccyflyer]

I have a number of models with inkjet printed waterslide decals and my observation is that they are great when first done, but even with several spray coats of clear varnish, if there is any damp about they tend to degrade and run, with the ink bleeding into the adjacent colours. The vibrancy of inkjet is superior to colour laser prints, but the latter last longer. The Achilles' Heel of both types is the inability to print in white, which means either living with a very much reduced colour saturation if using clear paper or having to cut closely round any decal printed on a white base layer. Though not waterslide I had some reasonable glossy laser printed decals a while back on ultrabright glossy paper. Also black and yellow decals that I printed on the Brother laser printer on Ozakling self adhesive vinyl the other day, worked fine, because the tissue covering that they were stuck on to was yellow -it would not have worked well with a darker background.  

 

The very best quality I've produced uses the ALPS thermal wax transfer printers, which do print in white (or metallics including silver and gold) allowing a perfect base layer to be produced and vibrant, long lasting decals. Unfortunately the printers are long since discontinued, incredibly pernickety to set up and keep working and will fail if you look at them sideways. Mine hasn't been used for years, but the few sheets of decals I produced were superb - I reckon factoring in all the costs that they must have been a couple of hundred quid per decal.

Edited November 1, 2023 by leccyflyer
typo

[Jon H]

4 minutes ago, leccyflyer said:

they are great when first done, but even with several spray coats of clear varnish, if there is any damp about they tend to degrade and run, with the ink bleeding into the adjacent colours

 

I had this exact issue with my ugly mustang. Leaving it in the shed over winter the decals couldnt cope with the damp and the ones on the wing need to be replaced. It might have been the lacquer i used though as i have used the same stuff on other projects and found it less than stellar. 

[Dickw]

I use self adhesive inkjet film for decals. You can get it in both clear and white, so printing the white on roundels or elsewhere is not a problem. The printed inks are not waterproof, so I spray the printed sheets with a clear lacquer before cutting out and applying - nothing special just a clear lacquer rattle can from the local car parts shop.

The attached image shows my TN Gnat mini EDF - the black numbering is printed on clear film and the roundels (40 mm diameter) and warning triangles on matt white film. Sourced from here https://www.gmcrafts.co.uk/product/matt-white-film-plastic/ 

Dick

 

[leccyflyer]

That's really nice. How do you cut your roundels out, so as not to leave a margin of white around their outside? Do you make them very slightly oversize and use a compass cutter or are you super high tech, print the self adhesive vinyl and then cut out the outlines with a Silhouette Cameo or Cricut machine?

[Dickw]

4 minutes ago, leccyflyer said:

That's really nice. How do you cut your roundels out, so as not to leave a margin of white around their outside? Do you make them very slightly oversize and use a compass cutter or are you super high tech, print the self adhesive vinyl and then cut out the outlines with a Silhouette Cameo or Cricut machine?

😀 No exotic machinery available so I just cut them out with a scalpel (new blade!) very carefully. Printing slightly oversize does make that job a bit easier.

It's not perfect, but good enough for everything except a close inspection. And the white covers the red background OK.

 

Dick

[FlyinFlynn]

Ex-printer engineer here. Inkjets and bubblejets (same thing really) always have, and always will, suffer from the same problem of blocked jets. The ink pathways are so small it takes a more or less continual flow of ink through them to keep the jets clear, if you leave them for any period of time they will dry out and become blocked, from there it is a hit and miss game of trying to clear them. I always opted for inkjet printers whose cartridges included a new head rather than those that had just ink in the cartridge..but they inevitably cost substantially more than an ink only cartridge.. Some printers mitigate this problem by firing the jets every so often into the waste container but this shortens the life of the ink cartridge and introduces another failure mode of a full waste cartridge/mat.. Many people go for 'continuous ink systems' which reduce the cost of the ink but does nothing for the problem of the heads drying up. There have also been hot wax printers in the periphery over the years but these suffer from other problems as well as the blocked jets issue in that they take a lot of power pre-print to melt the wax reservoir. are expensive to fill with the wax and are tricky to keep clean - the resultant prints though are usually quite good. Laser printers also produce really good prints but are expensive to operate and very expensive to repair when the inevitable problems arise. I don't think things have moved on essentially over the years, you canna break the laws of physics captain! 🙂

[MikeQ]

Bugger.  I thought if i left it 20yrs I’d be sorted.

 

i actually rang my local PrintaPront and explained what i wanted to do, thinking I could take the waterslide sheets in there and they could use their colour printer.  The guy cut me off half way through and virtually slammed the phone down.  ‘We dont do that kind of thing here, (you pervert).  SLAMMMM’.  Just about the same response at another local print shop 🤣

 

Oh well, at least I’m sorted for black transfers on the laser printer.

 

Thanks for the feedback.

 

mike

 

 

Edited November 1, 2023 by MikeQ

[Dickw]

I don't do much printing, maybe just a few pages a week, so an inkjet is all I need/use and blocked jets is not a problem. Surely you have a neighbour/friend/clubmate with an inkjet who could do a bit of colour printing for you. Helping each other is what makes this hobby so much fun.

 

Dick

[leccyflyer]

I ordered up some replacement matt white and clear self adhesive vinyl for laser thanks to DickW's link. Today though I'll be printing some laser printed waterslides, using a differrnt brand of paper and will see how those go.

[leccyflyer]

Quite pleased with how the laser printed waterslides turned out , with the ease of printing and how nicely they came away from the backing paper and slid into place. I squeegeed them off with a scrap of dense foam rubber to get the bulk of the water off and used a thumb to iron out any wee wrinkles, then left them overnight. I supposed ideally I'd give an overall spray coat of satin water based polyurethan, or maybe even floor polish, as with the plastic kits. It's important to get the most out of the A4 sheets by fitting as many decals on there as possible, so there's a bunch on here which will come in useful at some stage.

 

 

The cutting out to the outline is not as easy as it sounds, especially for the very small transfers. I'm going to experiment with using the Silhouette with printed registration marks to see how successful that is in cutting out the outlines more precisely. Overall though they waterslides do the job they are intended to do and this first test print was applied to my latest build - Les Rudd's Go Jet from RCM&E 1967. I was so impressed by Mark Dean's Go Jet at the Pontefract Single channel and vintage weekend in July that I knew I had to build one and the resemblance to my favourite V Bomber couldn't be missed. So the Go Jet is finished as XM717, a Victor B2(R) from543 Squadron that I climber all over the inside of when visiting RAF Wyton at an ATC summer camp in the early 70's. The nose of this aeroplane which took part in the Black Buck missions to bomb the Falklands is currently preserved in the RAF Museum Hendon, in that configuration as a tanker. Mine is an homage to the aeroplane in the early 70's, so wears the Strike Command scheme of that time.

 

[MikeQ]

On 01/11/2023 at 14:40, Dickw said:

I don't do much printing, maybe just a few pages a week, so an inkjet is all I need/use and blocked jets is not a problem. Surely you have a neighbour/friend/clubmate with an inkjet who could do a bit of colour printing for you. Helping each other is what makes this hobby so much fun.

 

Dick

You’re right.  PM me your adress and I’ll send you the transfer sheets and a SAE so you can do them for me 😂

Seriously though, I’ll ask the neighbour as he still hasn’t returned my VHS SeaAngler video on tying knots from 2002.

 

@leccflyer.  That looks pretty good but just in case I’m being thick.  This is printing inkjet on vinyl to create a peel and stick type decal as opposed to an Airfix/Tamiya waterslide type one right?  Or you went with a laser equivalent paper?

Edited November 3, 2023 by MikeQ

[leccyflyer]

The Go Jet decals above are laser printed on waterslide paper - so the laser compatible equivalent to the examples mentioned in the OP.  They make a very thin, delicate waterslide, but should be fully damp-proof, compared to the issues experienced with inkjet prints, when the damp gets at them. I have plenty of inkjet compatible paper, but it warns that it is not compatible with laser printers and I'd be scared of making an unholy mess and getting poor results.

 

Following DickW's recommendation, I also ordered some of the matt white and matt clear laser compatible self adhesive vinyl, as my stocks of that type of paper are seriously depleted. That arrived yesterday, having ordered it on Tuesday, which is very good. I've yet to try it out.

[FlyinFlynn]

16 hours ago, leccyflyer said:

 I have plenty of inkjet compatible paper, but it warns that it is not compatible with laser printers and I'd be scared of making an unholy mess and getting poor results.

 

The main reason why some papers are not suitable for laser printers is the fusing process in a laser printer involves squashing the paper between two heated rollers to melt the toner and push it into the paper fibres, It can all go seriously wrong when the 'paper' isn't fibrous enough to absorb the liquified toner or has some exotic coating and it could well end up getting wrapped around the fuser roll which these days will probably require a replacement fuser cartridge. In my day it used to mean an engineer visit to replace the fuser, so things have moved on positively in the intervening years! 

 

You are right to be cautious.