Laser printed decals that print white.
 

In the olden days, people could print white by using ALPS printers. Sandman used these and by reading his posts about not being able to get a replacement for his printer. I have notice that Micro Mark is selling a laser printer that comes with white toner. See here:

https://www.micromark.com/Ghost-Whi...-Printer-Bundle

However, the white toner is $350. Almost the same price as the printer itself. My question, is the cost worth it just to print white? I know that there is white decal paper, so one could have white areas on their decals if needed.

Also to Sandman: Would you consider one of these printers if you don't already have one?

The biggest problem I see is getting all-white decals. Like the text “US ARMY”. You would have no way to separate your text from the background white color of the decal.

For something simple, like stripes, you could cut the stripe and then apply it like a typical water slide decal.

If text is not too small, vinyl cut text decals are great. The surrounding vinyl is “picked”, leaving just the text on the transfer sheet.

Here is a BT-60 rocket that has slightly upscaled Bandit decals. The text is crisp and was easy to apply. Some is black, some is white.

Lee, in cases like printing black or some other color you could then print on decal paper that is clear so that you would not see the carrier film between the letters for example. But to print white would be nice if making USA Bars & Star insignia fro example for military rockets.

I researched this further, and found that Ghost White toner is made for many printers. https://www.ghost-white-toner.com/g...r-your-printer/

For my printer, a cartridge lists for $143 from the vendor. Just put it in place of the black. My black typically costs me about $70 each, so this is like the cost of two black cartridges.

Chris, I probably misunderstood your original question to sandman. Printing white would be nice, for decals like the example you cited. I was just talking about pure white text, and the fact that is not being possible on white decal paper.

I included my picture just to show how well white vinyl works for lettering. My picture of the entire rocket does show white text in vinyl. I just happened to have a picture of the black text that I included, to show the excellent detail of cut vinyl letters.

Micromark offers clear on blue background decal paper which can be used in the laser printer mentioned. Gordy looked at this but the problem is that for much of what he prints he first prints a white underlayer so the colored decal sits on top of a white underlayer. With the MicroMark printer you put the white toner cartridge in, print the white, then replace the white cartridge with the color cartridge, re-insert the paper, and print again. The printer does not hold onto the paper so it stays in register. Which means the likliehood the reinserted paper will be perfectly lined up is small. Yes, it's nice that there is now white toner if you want to do pure white decals on a laser printer. But it's not really a good replacement for ALPs printers.

That's good to know David. I felt that the toner cartridge for the HP printer that Micro Mark is selling was very expensive. So, have you printed your own decals?

You are right, printing white on white would not work. I was talking about printing white on clear decal paper.

Hmmm.

Thanks Gus for the information. I really have not looked into this. I was really wondering if it is cost effective or make printing decals more trouble than it is worth.