Question about etching enclosures

[electricgrave]

Will spray paint resist ferric acid? Like this one for example.
http://www.canadiantire.ca/AST/browse/6/Tools/PaintStains/SprayPaint/PRD~0481136P/Rust-Oleum+Universal+Flat+Spray+Paint.jsp?locale=en

I want to try etching, but I don't have a laser printer, so I had an idea of putting letter stickers on enclosure, spray paint, take off the letters and etch. Will it work?

[davent]

I'd say your method is sound but you'd need to do a test etch on something else to be sure your etch resist (paint choice) does in fact resist.

dave

[mremic01]

You'd have to be very careful to avoid having the stickers pull up the paint around them when your remove them. Also, ferric chloride will probably stain the paint, so you'd want to use the paint as a mask and remove it afterwards. I wouldn't bother to even try it if you're considering leaving the paint on.

I think using a laser printer would probably be the easiest and most reliable way though. I got a monochrome Brother for about 120$ a few years ago. You might be able to get a better deal if you check the used market. I've also found that cheapo Chinese made toner cartridge clones that you can get on Amazon tend to transfer better than the Brother ones.

[davent]

I think if you check around you'll find Brother Laser printers are singled out as the brand to be avoided for use in toner transferring and for other brands stick with the original manufacturer's toner.

dave

[mremic01]

Yeah, I bought it well before I got into etching. With the Brother toner cartridges, I can get some good transfers when they're new. They last a long time for regular printing, but they need to be pretty fresh or a good chunk of the toner will just peel off with the paper. The knock-off cartridges must use a different toner formula because they get better transfers for much longer, and cost less than half as much.

[electricgrave]

You'd have to be very careful to avoid having the stickers pull up the paint around them when your remove them. Also, ferric chloride will probably stain the paint, so you'd want to use the paint as a mask and remove it afterwards. I wouldn't bother to even try it if you're considering leaving the paint on.

I was going to sand off the paint actually. You are right about removing the stickers though. I've tried earlier today and smaller letters came off with paint, especially a's o's and e's. F U and Z came off fine though

I think using a laser printer would probably be the easiest and most reliable way though. I got a monochrome Brother for about 120$ a few years ago. You might be able to get a better deal if you check the used market. I've also found that cheapo Chinese made toner cartridge clones that you can get on Amazon tend to transfer better than the Brother ones.

Unfortunately money wise buying any printer at the moment is not an option. But I've got ferric chloride and I'm itching to try etching

[Roger Martin]

I used an unknown photo glossy paper.
But the white wont be separated with the black. Sticky altogether forever. Tried 3 times.
Some say Kodak paper is good, is it true?
Any suggestion?

[electricgrave]

Well, I tried it. A bit of etchant got under the paint, so the borders of the letters turned out a bit too fuzzy (no pun intended  ). Passable I guess, but it was very hard to line up the letter stickers. So I've decided to go with a printer. Got a used one yesterday for $25.

[mikitz]

Brother laser printer here. I have no problem with the transfer! However in Illustrator I set the print quality to "High Resolution"... it is perfectly clean etches.

A word about paper...
I was using laser photo paper and after the ironing transfer there was a clear layer of glue left that was very hard / impossible to remove, especially on thinner lines. But what I found worked really well (and is readily available at your local St*ples) is glossy laser magazine paper. With the glossy laser magazine paper etches take 5-9 minutes as described in Slade's tutorial and come out nice and clean.

Hope this helps someone out there.

[poppyman]

Hey electricgrave,

I tried both: spraying the box with stencils and using sticker letters...or spraying on sticker letters and remove them.


The problem with the letters is that sometimes the leave a little bit of gluey stickey material so the etching isn't really neat. but you can have sharp lines.

With spraying paint, some paint will be a bit resistant other will wear off just after a minute in the etchant. Usually I buy cheap spraypaint or fast drying paint for wall art (we have this "hardcore" brand in france). It's works pretty well but don't expect a super deep etch: if you wait too long the paint will start to go off because of the etchant and the lines will get fuzzy as said before no matter how sharp you letters of stencils were in the first place.

The overall look will be pretty rough/industrial/distressed which can be really nice too.

give it a go!

[poppyman]

the photo isn't flattering but here's an example I did with both sticker letters and a stencil: