Freecycle! I got a Canon LBP-430 for free; it uses the same Canon engine as the HP 4L. A replacement toner cart might be about $80, or much less if you can find a discount source (toner carts appear to last a long time if in the original sealed package). I already had a dying LBP-430 with a near-new toner cart (kindly paid for by my employer since none of the office printers would handle the special label stock). Possible drawbacks... these were only 300 dpi printers, and need a real printer port. But, there's USB to printer adapters, and those old printers were well-made.
It's likely that an $80 printer only comes with a "starter" toner cartridge, so you may be looking at spending nearly as much for a real toner cart before too long.
It's likely that an $80 printer only comes with a "starter" toner cartridge, so you may be looking at spending nearly as much for a real toner cart before too long.
I actually just bought that Brother printer yesterday. Hopefully it will last long enough to print out a few circuitboards since that's mainly what I will use it for. It doesn't seem to like the thicker photo paper I used, it's jammed up twice on me now. Did I get the right paper?
Canon Phopto Paper Plus Glossy II Link
Canon Phopto Paper Plus Glossy II Link
Have you tried to transfer an image yet?
There has always been rumors that the Brother laser printers don't work well for toner transfer due to the type of toner they use.
I bought my Samsung ML-2525W wireless printer a few weeks ago for $99 with free shipping. It's a great printer, my transfers turn out absolutely perfect. You can pic up the wired version (ML-2525) for around $70.
Also, glossy presentation or brochure paper works much better than that thick photo paper.
There has always been rumors that the Brother laser printers don't work well for toner transfer due to the type of toner they use.
I bought my Samsung ML-2525W wireless printer a few weeks ago for $99 with free shipping. It's a great printer, my transfers turn out absolutely perfect. You can pic up the wired version (ML-2525) for around $70.
Also, glossy presentation or brochure paper works much better than that thick photo paper.
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I think that's an Inkjet photo paper if so it will jam when exposed to the heat in a fuser. these types of paper have a special ink receptive surface.
I use a toner transfer paper in my konica reliable but relativly expensive. Try to get a laser compatable gloss paper like this:-
HP Gloss laser paper
Yes, I have already created a circuit board, the ink seemed to do fine wherever the paper would stick. Unfortunately it is so thick that I couldn't manage to get it to stick everywhere. Worked good enough for my first ever circuitboard, though.
Where did you get your printer?
Thanks for the info, I'll try to find it. Oh, and the rollers were jamming up the paper wouldn't even make it to the toner cartridge it is so thick.
It was on sale at tigerdirect. The ML-2525 sells on ebay for around $72 with free shipping.
Would you like to try some glossy presentation paper? It's super thin, so if it jams your printer there's something else wrong.
I have ~300 sheets of this stuff and will never use it all. PM me your address and I'll send you some.
Brother HL-2140
Something for the long term record...
I'll confirm that the official Brother toner in my HL-2140 is great for printouts that will be in a hot car or attic...
...but SUCKS for toner transfer etching. It seems that once the toner is fused, it will not become sticky again under an iron at any heat for any length of time. Once again, great for office work, but not for PCB's.
I bought it this weekend from newegg for just under $85 shipped with an extra USB cable.
Of all the things I excessively researched, toner was not one of them... and it bit me hard. :-(
The printer does work nicely with debian/lenny, but not all of the advanced features are there from windoze. That doesn't bother me much.
The printer does seem to print out 10mil traces cleanly. I hope to not have a project ever that excessive.
Google searches seem to indicate cheap refill kits will fix the toner transfer problem. uni-kit.com has one I may try for $15. I emailed them but got the standard "we don't know" answer back. They seem to be higher quality, so I may look for an even "cheaper" refill kit.
My old Minolta toner acts like glue when just partially heated. I'd use that laser printer, but the drum is going out and has bad snow and ghosting problems (it was cheaper to buy a new printer than try and fix this one). I've considered trying to swap toners between the printers, but I've heard that can be dangerous. I got the Minolta used a long time ago. Considering the drum wear, it has probably been refilled a few times. I just don't know the brand or the specs.
Back to my googling...
Something for the long term record...
I'll confirm that the official Brother toner in my HL-2140 is great for printouts that will be in a hot car or attic...
...but SUCKS for toner transfer etching. It seems that once the toner is fused, it will not become sticky again under an iron at any heat for any length of time. Once again, great for office work, but not for PCB's.
I bought it this weekend from newegg for just under $85 shipped with an extra USB cable.
Of all the things I excessively researched, toner was not one of them... and it bit me hard. :-(
The printer does work nicely with debian/lenny, but not all of the advanced features are there from windoze. That doesn't bother me much.
The printer does seem to print out 10mil traces cleanly. I hope to not have a project ever that excessive.
Google searches seem to indicate cheap refill kits will fix the toner transfer problem. uni-kit.com has one I may try for $15. I emailed them but got the standard "we don't know" answer back. They seem to be higher quality, so I may look for an even "cheaper" refill kit.
My old Minolta toner acts like glue when just partially heated. I'd use that laser printer, but the drum is going out and has bad snow and ghosting problems (it was cheaper to buy a new printer than try and fix this one). I've considered trying to swap toners between the printers, but I've heard that can be dangerous. I got the Minolta used a long time ago. Considering the drum wear, it has probably been refilled a few times. I just don't know the brand or the specs.
Back to my googling...
There is some truth to that, but here it costs $0.40-0.50USD per page at the print shops. There's also no guarantee they'll use the correct toner and paper that will be PCB etching compatible. Over the life of a cheap laser printer, the cost per page on standard paper is about $0.02-0.05USD depending on how it's used.
As a dying cripple, I'd also have to make my way out and back to the print shop multiple times at sometimes very odd hours of the day/night. Since I'm developing my own PCB's, that could mean multiple back to back trips if I screw up or do a board revision update. The stuff I'm making I only do small runs, so by the time I have a finished and tested design, I don't need to make any more.
So, this is the best option for me. I was really hoping to make my old laser printer work, but life sucks sometimes... and then it sucks again on top of that. There's also an old DeskJet in the other room that will be "recycled" once its ink cartridge goes. Two HP ink cartridges equals the price of this printer... and no more rabid ink streaking problems to deal with.
I just ordered an "ebay special" toner refill bottle at the $10 level. The seller is pretty big with high ratings, so I don't think I'll get screwed. We'll see how that goes next week.
A side note while on the subject of toner refill: Brother's are notorious for short cycling and being a royal pain when it comes to toner. It seems toner is the cash cow as razor blade sales are to the shaving companies. For those suffering "Sudden Tourette Syndrome" with their laser printer, here are 3 tips to search for to prevent the problem. These will help you get what you originally paid for (for all you capitalists) and help save the environment (for all you hippies out there).
1) Cover the clear plastic windows on the side of the toner cartridge (or the corresponding sensors in the cartridge bay) with pitch black electrical tape. This will prevent the notorious false alarm (or even cartridge kill) when 60% toner is left. It also helps to take the toner cartridge out and give it a gentle level side to side shake (as per the manual) to even out the toner.
2) The "flag gear" on black and color toner cartridges will advance as a counter even if toner from that particular cartridge isn't used. This often leads to color cartridges being declared empty when they're hardly used and still 90% full. A good refill PDF document from one of the refill seller sites will explain the details and how to properly reset this. Proper is a key word as the gear also seems to affect the toner charge voltage.
3) The more advanced printers keep a page count in their little brains. If the first 2 options don't work, there's a maintenance menu to reset the various counters. Getting to the menu varies by model, so do a search for it.
* Now the warning: Doing these can mess with the printer warning functions. This isn't a big deal IF you pay attention to printer output quality. When the output starts going wrong in some way, it's time to replace the relevant cartridge. Do NOT let the cartridge(s) go empty. There are some reports that it could damage the rollers and drum. The way Brother does toner in its low end printers, it is recycled into the main hopper instead of going to a "used/dump hopper". Recycled toner only works for so long before it starts failing. In these cartridges, there WILL be some left over that's junk.
Hopefully these tips will help someone. Now I'm in wait mode for replacement toner.
As it turns out, we're all dying. That's not much consolation though, so I'm sorry if you're looking down the barrel of a gun.
Hmm.
It seems you guys are committed to toner transfer. I use UV resist coated board myself, which I develop with sodium hydroxide, which is cheap. We call it caustic soda, kinda like we call HCl 'spirits of salt'.
I make the stencils on an inkjet printer using inkjet transparency sheets. I was worried that the sheets would prove unsuitable, since I previously had access to a laser printer which I used with regular transparency sheets, but it turned out to work fine. The contrast ratio is marginal, i.e. you have to get the exposure just right, but if you get it right it works fine. It was a problem even with the laser printer. I can do 10 thou traces.
Of course you have to buy resist-coated PCB, and you need a UV lightbox. It's quick, reliable and easy to do doublesided tho'. It gets my vote.
w
I used to use the UV method. The main drawback as I see it is that the resist does age. This is especially an issue if you buy pre-coated boards. After six months to a year in storage, the resist won't develop leaving you with a useless board. I used to use photo resist that came in a rattle can. Worked great! But try finding that stuff these days... Especially in the US. All my UV-based protos was done in Europe. The developer - sodium hydroxide, NaOH (aka caustic soda) - is available in most European grocery stores or hardware stores as it's a common drain cleaner. The only place I've seen it in the US has been on-line in DIY soap supply stores.
The toner transfer is not as "clean" as the UV transfer so the transferred image won't be as sharp. But for 90 % of stuff, it's fine. For the remaining 10 %, I'd go with a cheapo PCB service like Gold Phoenix or Olimex.
For toner transfer, I recommend using 20 mil trace/space when possible. 15 mil in a pinch. 80 mil pads (65 mil in a pinch). That's fine for leaded components and is actually what I used when I was doing UV transfer.
I get good results with my ancient HP Laserjet 4 printer. 32 MB of RAM, baby! 🙂 I think it's 600 DPI. I use HP brochure paper. Until now I've only used a clothes iron for the transfer, but am anxious to use the laminator I bought for the purpose a while back. I've made double-sided boards with a fraction of a millimeter registration error between top and bottom layer -- same precision as I got with UV back in the day...
~Tom
The toner transfer is not as "clean" as the UV transfer so the transferred image won't be as sharp. But for 90 % of stuff, it's fine. For the remaining 10 %, I'd go with a cheapo PCB service like Gold Phoenix or Olimex.
For toner transfer, I recommend using 20 mil trace/space when possible. 15 mil in a pinch. 80 mil pads (65 mil in a pinch). That's fine for leaded components and is actually what I used when I was doing UV transfer.
I get good results with my ancient HP Laserjet 4 printer. 32 MB of RAM, baby! 🙂 I think it's 600 DPI. I use HP brochure paper. Until now I've only used a clothes iron for the transfer, but am anxious to use the laminator I bought for the purpose a while back. I've made double-sided boards with a fraction of a millimeter registration error between top and bottom layer -- same precision as I got with UV back in the day...
~Tom
Thanks
Toner transfer just seems easiest for me...at least if I could get my equipment to work right. I got an email saying my toner bottle shipped today, so I should have it by next week. Hopefully this will stick when reheated.
I used the muriatic+hydrogen peroxide method on my first board that "barely" made it (from the old laser printer). I must say it was fast, but here's a WARNING: even though I let the used acid sit for about 15-20mins while cleaning everything up, it was not done outgassing. I put it in a sealed bottle that wasn't leaking like the old muraitic bottle. The next day I went into the garage and the bottle had severely ballooned and nearly exploded. Needless to say it would have been a disaster since it was by my car and some other semi-important stuff. The moral, LEAVE THE LID SLIGHTLY UNTWISTED the first day just in case the slow chemical reactions aren't quite done. Even with the dangers, I'd recommend this combo as it's cheap and can be regenerated.
I considered this method... and may again. I heard the UV spray can was really expensive. I couldn't find one, also, so left it. As mentioned about pre-coated boards expiring with time, I'm also a little concerned about ordering them as I won't know how long they've been sitting in a warehouse. One thing I like about toner transfer and the UV spray can is that they can be washed off and reapplied if there's a screw up.
Since both you guys do/have done UV, can y'all comment on this? I've heard of some people using sunlight instead of a UV box. I think they sandwiched the UV copper clad and transparency stencil between 2 sheets of glass to keep them firmly together and left them outside for a little while. How viable is that? I sure have plenty of sunlight here, esp. during the summer.
I haven't done much etching yet, but based on my initial tests, I would tend to second this. My first board was a floating regulator and I used 50mil traces for through-hole parts and higher current capacity. Since that board etched out so badly (from my old laser printer), I had to do a lot of tinning to fix it. The wider traces made that so much easier. Most of what I do will be using through-hole parts, so I'd recommend the wider traces to anyone else doing likewise if the space is available. My current AVR MCU board also uses them, but I had to drop to 20mil in a few places then go back up. This is generally OK for audio and low frequency projects, but be careful if doing RF as strange "magic" can happen. For those searching the long term records, remember that DIY etching is just that and is rarely perfect. Giving a little extra "etch room" can save a lot of headaches.
32m is a monster. 🙂 I remember upgrading the old-old laser printer I inherited before my current old one. I think it only had 1meg and was barfing a lot. I found an extra SIMM in my parts box (8 or 16m, can't remember) and it worked great after. I've been wondering about upgrading my new HL-2140, but I think it has enough for a full page at high-res.
I've also been curious about laminators but can't justify the cost for what little I'll end up doing. I've been tempted to try double sided, but my hands have stability issues, and I don't have an adequate drill press to really do it right. What little drilling I've done in the past with other projects has driven me nuts. With single sided etching, I cheat with creative layouts and the occassional jumper wire. >🙂
I wonder if a junked laser printer could be used as a laminator? Presumably a printer with the option of a straight paper path would need less modification... like that old LBP430 that I haven't had the heart to scrap yet.
When I used photoresist from a spray can, the results weren't great. It spattered, and eventually clogged or ran out of propellant before it was empty. The best coating results were by using liquid positive photoresist, diluted 50%, and spread evenly with a disposable foam brush. Let it flow out for a while in a dark place, then if you're impatient, bake it dry. I sometimes used a junk toaster oven, or an improvised oven made from a big tin bucket with a heater element in the bottom.
As for the life of photosensitive boards. I'm pretty sure I successfully used boards that I'd coated 5 to 10 years previously. Maybe the chemistry has changed recently due to ROHS or something. The presensitized boards I bought more recently are a different colour, and the resist behaves differently. I guess I should check whether those are still good.
The trick with using imperfect (as in not solid black) transparencies is to print several copies, and stack them. I did that using penplots on frosted mylar back in the '80s. It works for inkjet and laser transparencies too.
The other trick is to do a test strip. Use a scrap strip of board and a representative sample of artwork. Mark a series of intervals down the strip, label them 25 to 5 for example, cover everything but the "25" portion, then every five minutes reveal the next part of the board until done. Develop, and see what exposure time gives the best result. It's a standard photo darkroom technique. If my explanation doesn't make sense, google "exposure" and ""test strip" and you'll find some guides. Or dust off an old book on photo darkroom techniques.
When I used photoresist from a spray can, the results weren't great. It spattered, and eventually clogged or ran out of propellant before it was empty. The best coating results were by using liquid positive photoresist, diluted 50%, and spread evenly with a disposable foam brush. Let it flow out for a while in a dark place, then if you're impatient, bake it dry. I sometimes used a junk toaster oven, or an improvised oven made from a big tin bucket with a heater element in the bottom.
As for the life of photosensitive boards. I'm pretty sure I successfully used boards that I'd coated 5 to 10 years previously. Maybe the chemistry has changed recently due to ROHS or something. The presensitized boards I bought more recently are a different colour, and the resist behaves differently. I guess I should check whether those are still good.
The trick with using imperfect (as in not solid black) transparencies is to print several copies, and stack them. I did that using penplots on frosted mylar back in the '80s. It works for inkjet and laser transparencies too.
The other trick is to do a test strip. Use a scrap strip of board and a representative sample of artwork. Mark a series of intervals down the strip, label them 25 to 5 for example, cover everything but the "25" portion, then every five minutes reveal the next part of the board until done. Develop, and see what exposure time gives the best result. It's a standard photo darkroom technique. If my explanation doesn't make sense, google "exposure" and ""test strip" and you'll find some guides. Or dust off an old book on photo darkroom techniques.
I don't see that easily working, and I think you hit the nail on the head. My new HL-2140 has a "mostly straight" through paper path (at least an alternative path, that is), but there is still some bending. I would think that would be very hard to fix. There's also the issue of the transfer drum being very hard and not flexible in any way (at least in the 3 laser printers I've had). I would think hard drum + hard copper clad = something breaking. With the 3 inkjets I've had, they've all printed about 1/4 inch above the paper, so with that technology there is a lot of flexibility.
That's too bad, but I guess not too surprising in hind sight.
Both good tips. I don't think I've seen the test strip mentioned before, but that makes sense. I think you explained it well. I used to do film photography, but never did my own developing.
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My replacement toner for my HL-2140 came in yesterday. I used inkowl.com. They also have an ebay store that seems popular with good reviews. This "messy" afternoon I cleaned out my starter cartridge, did a partial refill of it, and added the flag gears. Total cost was just under $15 shipped. They have instructions on all that, but I also recommend doing a quick youtube search.
The printer accepted the cartridge changes just fine. The first print after all this was also good, which surprised me. Sometimes it takes a page or two before everything settles down.
The good news is that the toner is now sticking to the copper clad, at least in my short test today.
Over the next few days I'm going to start doing the paper tests I couldn't do on my old laser printer. I'm also going to try and swap around drivers as the toner density on the paper looks a little thin. Different driver settings and paper types from the drop down menus don't seem to do much.
Quick edit additional note: I'd give inkowl.com a "medium" grade on copper clad stickiness. Official Brother toner gets a "none". My old laser printer toner gets a "high".
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I've had an old HP5P for more than a decade. You can often find them cheap from computer recyclers. The cork will have fallen off the internal solenoids, leaving a sticky surface that causes maddening paper jams. Get one free or near free for this reason, disassemble and clean off the sticky stuff from the solenoids and ignore the sound deadening cork. Refill the cartridges dozens of times with toner from TonerRefillKits.com (a super outfit) and you have the most economical printer known to man. Add some memory for full page graphics.
That's interesting about toner. I'd assumed it was all basically the same plastic dust. I ought to try each of the laser printers I have access to, and see if there's differences in the results.
As for turning a printer into a laminator, the critical parts would be the fuser drum and roller. You'd probably need to remove all other drums and rollers, so maybe the original paper path wouldn't matter as long as you can get a clear shot in and out. Photocopiers should work too, if you can find one to cannibalize.
My experience with the spray photoresist wasn't with a fresh can, and since it was back in the '80s, there's a good chance that current products work better. Last time I looked, the brand I used no longer offered a spray can version. They say it was mainly due to safety concerns, but also inconsistent quality. I guess the trend is to use dry film resist, which apparently is best applied with a laminator, but may be workable using a hair dryer.
As for turning a printer into a laminator, the critical parts would be the fuser drum and roller. You'd probably need to remove all other drums and rollers, so maybe the original paper path wouldn't matter as long as you can get a clear shot in and out. Photocopiers should work too, if you can find one to cannibalize.
My experience with the spray photoresist wasn't with a fresh can, and since it was back in the '80s, there's a good chance that current products work better. Last time I looked, the brand I used no longer offered a spray can version. They say it was mainly due to safety concerns, but also inconsistent quality. I guess the trend is to use dry film resist, which apparently is best applied with a laminator, but may be workable using a hair dryer.
I guess I should update after playing around with it some and being sick for a month...
Inkowl had problems after several prints. Turns out the toner they sent me wasn't the best for the 2140. They were nice and sent me a different replacement bottle. So far that has been working nicely, but I still don't print much with the 2140.
I found some kind of glossy paper in my stash that seems to work for the transfers. When it sticks, it sticks really hard. Of the few boards I've done, I get small random pieces that flake off sometimes. I don't think this is the toner as the rest of the board can be nailed with a scrub brush without problems.
A few magazine papers give different results that are generally unacceptable. One turned out to be good for the stencil, though.
I played with a lot of the Brother driver settings in linux. I can't see any difference.
My final conclusion: Brother toner is fine for office printing but sucks for toner transfer. Non-Brother replacement toner seems to fix most of these issues. I've also run into this conclusion a couple times in odd corners of Internet that weren't very obvious.
Now my current problem is that my cupric chloride home brew quit etching... even though there's plenty of acid, it's cheery green, and I've added a cheap fish tank bubbler. My guess, after too much googling, is that it needs super-peroxide that I don't have in stock.
Inkowl had problems after several prints. Turns out the toner they sent me wasn't the best for the 2140. They were nice and sent me a different replacement bottle. So far that has been working nicely, but I still don't print much with the 2140.
I found some kind of glossy paper in my stash that seems to work for the transfers. When it sticks, it sticks really hard. Of the few boards I've done, I get small random pieces that flake off sometimes. I don't think this is the toner as the rest of the board can be nailed with a scrub brush without problems.
A few magazine papers give different results that are generally unacceptable. One turned out to be good for the stencil, though.
I played with a lot of the Brother driver settings in linux. I can't see any difference.
My final conclusion: Brother toner is fine for office printing but sucks for toner transfer. Non-Brother replacement toner seems to fix most of these issues. I've also run into this conclusion a couple times in odd corners of Internet that weren't very obvious.
Now my current problem is that my cupric chloride home brew quit etching... even though there's plenty of acid, it's cheery green, and I've added a cheap fish tank bubbler. My guess, after too much googling, is that it needs super-peroxide that I don't have in stock.
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