InkJet Printers that will print WHITE!

I had a chance to buy an Alps many years ago - always regretted not doing so. But that aside, there are printers that will print white - have a look here if you have deep pockets - at least deeper than mine.

www.okidata.com/.../pro920wt

Ouch $7K, guess I have to wait till I hit the Loto.  Thanks for the link Bick!

I have 3 HP printers that I was really disappointed with.  Lousy software, inferior mechanics.  Buy any other brand!

The ALPS style printer printed with a ribbon cart, like an old school typewriter, you could put a white or multi colour ribbon in it, but it would use the same amount of ribbon cart regardless if you printed a solid sheet....  or a single dot.

A bit expensive, I'm told...

Fantasy Printshop (& I'm sure others as well) will do limited run (min order required though) custom decals, silk-screened with proper ink to your design.

Other options are a 'pfaff.

eg., Print custom decal with all colours of design needed, leaving the white part needed blank, on to white decal sheet.

Or slice & dice solid colour sheet,

When you find this affordable printer, probably at the Shangri-La Dollar Store, let me know.....

Hello!

I thought about buying a printer capable of printing decals, too - that was some time ago. But now I found a company that would do it for me. I send them a design in CorelDRAW and get the prints next week. So I don't see a point in buying a printer now - I only order from them once in several months, and even if I needed more decals, I don't have to worry about ordering materials, inks, maintaining the machine and such, so that's much better than actually owning such a machine.

Ink jets never printed white, by the way - that were the thermo-transfer printers that cover the medium with precise quantities of heated wax, which provides good coverage - unlike the inks, that are mostly translucent and rely on white background for light reflection. And thermo-transfer technology is more expensive and slower to print than inkjet.

Anyhow, good luck with your decals and have a nice day

Paweł

I think the chances of a printer mfg making a special model of their printer for folks to print white decals with are pretty slim.  The number of modelers who do such custom modeling is so small compared to the customer base of regular printers I doubt if the mfgs would get very excited.  More likely would be a third party who'd produce a white cartridge and software to patch the printer driver.

In the meantime, you need to rely on white decal film.

Paweł

Do you have a link for the outfit that prints your decals?  By the way, they are not out of Chicago by any chance?

Radarider

I don't know why more people don't just use white decal film, as Don mentions.

I you need white in the middle of a decal, like the big VA-35 White circle, you just print your colored decal on the White decal sheet, cut close around the outside of the black circle and use the decal as you would if it were a professional sheet.

So many modern modelers already cut their decals that close, to git rid of all of the clear carrier film that they can,,,,,,,,so the skill set is already out there and being used. Removing white without diveting the decal's outside shape is no different than removing the clear without diveting. If you think you might divet your decal when cutting it out, just print another copy of the "outer part of the black circle" on clear film and lay it over your white printed decal. Some model companies make us put decals on in multiple layers already, anyway.

Rex

Radarider - sorry for taking so long to answer your post. The people I'm workin with can be contacted by mail under biuro@meliusmanu.pl

Although they are from Poland, just write them and see how they would handle your order - maybe it's practicable despite the distance.

Rex - using a white sheet surely is more economical than buying a specialized, expensive equipment. Still, that doesn't solve the all problems - like for example "fine white print" - like all the markings on US OD vehicles. By the way - I could never agree with the "trim all the film away" people. OK, sometimes you're left with no alternative - like on a NMF, or, generally speaking, if the decals are crappy, so that the film is still visible after they are down. But I always felt it kinda defeats the purpose of decals. If I was good enough with a scalpel to always trim the film away, I'd probably do some masks and use them to paint the markings. I'd say with good quality decals you just need to get close, and the film shouldn't be visible when the decaling is done.

Good luck with your projects and have a nice day

Paweł

Pawel, I am not a "trimmer" either,,,,,,,,,I use the system as it was designed by "someone" back in the sixties. (if I say ModelDecal, it will be Microscale, or MicroMark, or someone)

the film was left around the decal to help with the "layers of ink blending in" when MicroSet and Sol first came out.

one way to work around white numbers and letters is to write them in black, print the background color all around them (either squared off or a random blotch) then change the black areas to clear. This only works if you can get your decal color and paint to match really close.

One way to get them to match is to print out your color on some white film, and match the paint to that,,,,,it is the same as matching a professionally purchased decal to paint colors when you have to (which is fairly often). Print out your color samples and pick you color, then match your paint, then do the drawing with that color added into your program's pallette.

granted, this would be a PITA to do for making white numbers for a Jeep kit, and having to make all of your Olive Drab for that model have to match the decal film before you could paint the model

But, it would work for smaller things,,,,,,,,,like white Happy Hooligans script on the wingtip tanks of your F-89 Scopion.

Rex

I should say something else about me and this white decal deal.

I build a lot of aircraft that use White as the main color of all of the large and small markings and stencils. And I will go a longggg way out of my way to buy and replace a collection of decal sheets with lots of white parts on them so that I can just look for anything I need,,,,or "just slice a bit off of this A so I have another V", that sort of thing.

but, sometimes there is no choice,,,,,,,,,,but, I still do any white printing as seldom as I can get away with it.

Rex

Trimming closely for simple geometric shapes is easy.  The problem comes with more difficult shapes, say script text where you would have to cut out around each letter, with complex letter/number shapes.  

I have sometimes scanned a sample of the paint used in a background area, and set that as background of the graphics area, and even then, after printing, the match was not exact.  I have not got into printer color calibration yet- that seems like a can of worms :-(

Don, try it in the opposite direction,,,,,,just like if you had to match the blue on a commercial decal sheet.

Only, instead,,,,paint a plastic "scanning square" with your paint,,,,,scan that in and either design the background of your decal, or print out a square on decal paper

then mix your paint to match your decal, instead of trying to hit and miss trying to match a decal to an already painted model, once you have your PC's "decal Blue" matching your new mix of model paint "Blue that matches the decal Blue",,,,,you can print out your decal and it will match

Hello!

Yeah, that could work. Still, I prefer to send my design out and get decals printed in all colours with nice, thin film - with the small amount of work that gets done due to my slow building tempo that's definitely economically sound. Have a nice day!

Paweł