Stokes' ProjBlog

A non-sticky situation January 12, 2008

Last week, I finally got around to printing the new motor controller board. Since I did not have any usable glossy magazine pages as I’d used in my first toner-transfer attempt, I opted to use high-gloss inkjet paper.

It was a catastrophic failure.

Despite a myriad of toner-transfer articles on the web singing the praises of high-gloss inkjet paper, very little transferred to the copper-clad board at all. Surprisingly, the cheap, thin magazine/catalog paper worked much better. There were other differences, so I really can’t point at any single one as being the point of failure.

• The heavy, high-gloss paper is substantially thicker than the original paper, so I may have needed more heat and/or time.
• I tried using slightly less pressure with the iron in an attempt to avoid the bleeding I saw on my first attempt with the carrier boards, a hint I gleaned from the web.
• The thicker board may have required more heat.
• There was a hell of a lot of toner to transfer compared to my previous attempt.

I have one remaining copy of the motor board traces on the high-gloss paper; if that doesn’t work, I’m going back to the catalog pages.