Printer for transparencies. HP any good?

Just tried out my new hp P2015dn... not very good :-(

...Jim Thompson

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|  James E.Thompson, P.E.                           |    mens     |
|  Analog Innovations, Inc.                         |     et      |
|  Analog/Mixed-Signal ASIC\'s and Discrete Systems  |    manus    |
|  Phoenix, Arizona            Voice:(480)460-2350  |             |
|  E-mail Address at Website     Fax:(480)460-2142  |  Brass Rat  |
|       http://www.analog-innovations.com           |    1962     |
             
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If you only require occasional transparencies, try your local print shop. I do so little paper printing now ,the cartridge has usually dried up. I just load a memstick, and go to the local internet caff. I send invoices as pdf files, and let the customer print them !

Martin

I still keep an old Laserjet IIIp for this purpose and printing onto glossy inkjet paper for PCB transfer, it works better than many modern ones, and seems utterly indestructable.

I'm still looking, but I haven't found any print shops yet that can make a decent job. They all use lasers and the results are always about as bad as the laser I can use at work. I'm sure I remember my old Epson Inkjet working no-end better.

Cheers,

Coin.

I've never had much luck with lasers. Maybe it's just the modern ones. They seem about passable for PCB layouts, but my current masterpiece needs a black-on-white, back-illuminated front panel. All the lasers I've tried make it look really patchy :o(

Cheers,

Colin.

That makes sense. I've never found a laser that makes a really good job of transparencies. None of them seem to be able to manage large black areas. It seems to be down to how fast they can replenish the drum with toner after a huge wodge of it has ended up on the paper. I was sort-of expecting my ideal printer to turn out to be an inkjet.

Cheers,

Colin.

"Colin Stamp" schreef in bericht news: snipped-for-privacy@4ax.com...

The only real good HP I used for this purpose was an HP LaserJet 5000. A heavy duty office machine too expensive for soho. This days I use a old LaserJet 4Si but I need to stack two sheets and even then I cannot expose it too long.

petrus bitbyter

Try diddling with the control panel for the printer. There are often toner-saving modes enabled. For example my ancient HP 5L has economode to save toner and a ret option I can set to dark. I can get quite nice large black areas. Best advice was from the guy saying to offload the work to a commercial printer. That's the ticket.

Maybe a silk screening firm could help. When I was still in the UK, my local silkscreen firm used to print on dummy drinks cans, for photoshoots. I have no idea how they did it.

Martin

The trick for PCB work is to use tracing paper - this has much better toner adhesion and 'blackness' than transparencies. You need to use fairly thick stuff (90 GSM or more) to prevent crinkling in the fuser.

You want a shop that does printing with an offset press, and you want the output done on the photoplotter they use for preparing the artwork for the plates - if they have direct digital presses, you might be out of luck. If you don't ask for the right thing, you'll also be out of luck.

If they are photo-exposing plates, they will have something that will make good dense blacks and sharp lines with clear clear parts - and that is the device you want used for making your transparencies. The one which I used to access was not (so far as I know) a "classic Gerber", it was more printshop oriented with a PostScript interface - but it exposed a photosensitive film with a light beam, and resulted in crisp artwork, no toner involved.

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Cats, coffee, chocolate...vices to live by

I have an HP LaserJet 5000, you say it's good for making big black areas on transparencies? I've gotta try that.

I set the toner to maximal black and used tracing paper at the time. A kind of paper that can stand the heat of laser printers (and copiers). Got no even a single pinhole on a 1" square black. Using the same paper in the LaserJet 4Si does not work even when I used some "blackout" spray (A type of lacquer meant to equalize the toner.) Tried every laser printer within reach ever since but so far no luck.

petrus bitbyter

I get excellent PCB transparencies with an HP DeskJet 5940 printer (about =A360) and Jetstar Premium film from Mega Electronics. I often use 10 mil tracks, and can go down to 8 mils if necessary.

Leon

Yep. I was thinking along the lines of photoplotting, but I haven't found any local firms yet. I guess I need to look harder. The particular job I need to do at the moment is a front panel that's practically all black and illuminated from the back. I reckon a photoplot would work nicely for that.

Cheers,

Colin.

I've diddled endlessly with the one at work, to no avail :o(

Yep. Someone round here must be able to do it for me. I'll find them eventually...

Cheers,

Colin.

adhesion and 'blackness'

prevent crinkling in the

Hmmm, I haven't tried tracing paper yet. Lately, because of the duff inkjet, I've been using a cheap Samsung laser printer on transparencies. I've had to increase my track width from 12mil to

20mil to avoid them occasionally petering out.

I'll have to give it a go...

Cheers,

Colin.

toner adhesion and 'blackness'

to prevent crinkling in the

Yes. Tracing apaper or matt draughting film. Dense fine lines. Mine's the Samsung ML-2250. It's proved perfect for all the surface mount adapters I begrudgingly need to make. I use it set at standard 600dpi but most important (as someone mentioned) is to turn off it's "Toner save" option.

[From bitter experience, I say **** the ******* Epson ******* inkjets. Excellent printing but ******* **** reliability and ludicrously ******* expensive to run :].

Colin Stamp:

I'm using a HP LJ2100 and this kind of film.

OH-films is no good for that kind of work. The best is to have a screenprinter make the film for you.