Press N Peel Blue Woes?

[97STRATDELUXER]

I bought a sheet of this to try to print to my own copper boards from Steve at Smallbear...I get a great print onto the dull side of my paper,but no matter what I've tryed,I can't get the press n peel to leave a thick legible print onto the copper board? I'm using a HP 750C printer and my wife's trusty iron on the first setting below steam....All I get is a very very light outline of the printed drawing? Any ideas guys would be greatly appreciated...

John

[vanhansen]

It could be because that printer is an inkjet, not a laser.  That'll make a big difference.  I don't know of anyone who has had any success using inkjet printers with P-n-P Blue.

[1wahfreak]

Is the HP 750 a laser printer. I don't think P&P will work with any other type of printer. Did you clean the board really well by using fine sandpaper or steel wool? Any finger oils or other contaminants will keep it from sticking.

[Mark Hammer]

The key element here is that inkjet ink dries on the sheet whereas laser toner fuses with it.  As a result of that bond, when heat causes that same toner to fuse with the copper surface, the toner pulls the blue layer off the plastic sheet with it.  The same thing will not happen with inkjet ink.

The good news is that if you print out your pattern on plain white paper, and bring the PnP sheet to any photocopier, you can make your resist sheets that way.  If the person at the copy centre gives you any grief, tell them this is EXACTLY the same acetate sheet type used for photocopiable transparency blanks.  It will NOT melt in the photocopier, and the blue emulsion is only marginally thicker than the relatively clear emulsion on transparency sheets, so it will not jam or otherwise gum up the photocopier.  These sheets are INTENDED for use in photocopiers and laser printers.  If you want double insurance coverage on persuading the copy centre person, print off the tutorial that the press and peel people have posted, where it will show the sheets being used.

Now, about the sheet you already "used", what's the collective verdict here?  Can he wipe off the surface and re-use it in a laser printer with some expectation of results?  I'm sure we'd all like to save him a couple of bucks, and the annoyance of having to order more.

[97STRATDELUXER]

It could be because that printer is an inkjet, not a laser.  That'll make a big difference.  I don't know of anyone who has had any success using inkjet printers with P-n-P Blue.

Thanks for the posts guys...Yep,my problem is that I'm printing using the wrong type of printer...I'll go to my local print shop and take Mark's advice.Meantime I'll get some more PNP blue from Steve...Thanks for all the informative posts guys.

[shawn]

I love Press N Peel when they actually work. I've had roughly half of my attempts screw up or only some of the traces don't transfer completely.  That's the reason why I'm attempting to make my own pcbs using a plotter. So far the results are great.

[Paul Perry (Frostwave)]

I'm sure you could wipe off the ink jet ink. use water or methylated spirits, but NOT acetone or like solvents. And... be gentle!

[Hal]

do it in staples's DIY copy center when nobody's looking

[DavidS]

Hey shawn, want to give us any more info about the plotter? Sounds intruiging!

[Paul Perry (Frostwave)]

The 'easy' plotter approach, is to mod the plotter to plot in ink (hopefully resistant!) straight on the PCB.
The HARD way, is to mod the plotter to move a cutting head & cut thru the copper...

[shawn]

Hey shawn, want to give us any more info about the plotter? Sounds intruiging!

This site gave me the idea, also note he also shows you how to make your own etching tank:

http://www.willcoxonline.com/PCBplotting/

Now I will warn you, printing is a major bitch.  I spent 5 days figuring out Eagle in order for it to export to HPGL which is the graphics format that the printer can print to.  Luckily Eagle is free if you want to create smaller boards but I'm in the process of finding something that is free and relatively easy to send a job to the printer without pulling my hair.  Now if I could find a way for ExpressPCB to export I'd be golden.

[Mark Hammer]

do it in staples's DIY copy center when nobody's looking

You probably want to verify which side gets printed to on a sheet of paper before committing to feeding the PnP through.  You can kill two birds with one stone by putting a small pencil mark on a piece of regular paper (to keep track of which side was "up"), cranking up the darkness a bit on the copier and feeding that sheet through the manual feed.  That will let you know: a) which side of the sheet gets printed on, and b) whether you need to adjust the darkness to get good transfer of toner to the sheet.  Ideally, you want a nice thick crisp toner layer on the blue layer of the PnP to get good adherence to the copper board.  Many of the problems people experience with PnP can come from having part of the pattern stick to the copper but not all of it.

The other thing is that you can use the emergence of the outline of a pattern to let you know when you've ironed "enough".  The thicker the toner layer, the easier it is to see that pattern.