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This is a follow-up on some previous items...

Saturday, I printed up three sheets of decals for a marathon session of finishing, and wanted to pass along some comments on the results:

FIRST -- The Lexmark inks work reasonably well, and are at least as opaque as the HP inks, if not a bit more so. One drawback is it takes longer for the ink to dry in photo-quality mode, and this creates a new problem: On my printer (Z816), there are some mechanical issues with the guide wheels and the print cartridge shuttle that still cause less-than-perfect prints. The brass star wheels that are supposed to keep the paper down have a bad tendency to lift the still-wet ink from the sheet in tiny dots as it passes. In normal- or treated-paper mode, the sheet is jerked at an angle coming out of the feed area, even though the prints appear to be aligned with the edges. I don't know if this is a problem with the guide system, or just the paper feed area not being aligned itself. In transparency-mode, the sheet is pulled slowly into the print area.

SECOND -- The normal slow-cure Krylon Gloss Acrylic spray tends to dry very glossy, while the quick-dry version tends to form a stiff skin that isn't glossy at all. More frosted-translucent than clear. Also, the VALSPAR "American Traditions" version tends to dry a bit frosted and cloudy, and when the volume in the can reaches the end, the properties tend to change rapidly. I've been wanting to try out the non-aerosol version of spirit-based Minwax Polycrylic in a detail spray gun, to see if the results are more controllable. More on this later.

THIRD -- I'm going to try at least one of these Papilio sheets in my Epson today, to see if the sheets are compatable with the inks. I hope so; the Epson inks are solvent-based instead of water-based, and are waterproof when cured. Plus, they are considerably more opaque than either the HP or Lexmark inks. More later.