Ever wanted to give someone a custom glass as a gift? Perhaps a set of engraved wine glasses as a wedding gift, or a customized pint glass for Father's Day, or even a whole set of drinking glasses for your book club with your favorite quotes on them. The options are endless, but did you know that this is something you can make yourself? In this week's blog post I'll be tackling glass etching using our reusable silk screen stencils and etching cream. I'll be testing out two different brands of etching cream (Etchall and Cadence) AND I'll be testing out how many times I can reuse a single stencil before the etching cream "eats it up". Plus I'll be sharing some tips and tricks you don't want to miss out on. So if you want to create your own customized glasses, keep on reading :) Getting Ready Before I get into any details let me briefly explain my testing experiment with you. There were 3 questions on my mind:
To find out I bought these cute little glass jars I found in a local convenience store. Then using part of a design I already had, (Made with Love Kitchen Silkscreen), I made two identical silkscreen stencils - one for each brand of etching cream. Add onto that two brands of etching cream, gloves, a little spoon, an old plastic card, and a blue and red whiteboard marker to mark the jars so I knew which side was stenciled with what brand. And I was ready to go! I started out with 8 jars intending to stencil every jar twice on opposite sides. One side would be stenciled using Etchall and its corresponding stencil. The other side would be stenciled with Cadence using the other stencil. In the end I had to get more jars, but more on that later. Let's first have a look at the difference between the two brands. etchall vs. cadence There are many different brands of etching cream out there, but not all are suitable to be used with silkscreens. Some brands are simply too strong and will eat up your precious stencils quite quickly (Armour Etch is one of them). So it's important to know which brand of etching cream will work best. For my experiment I decided to test what I had on hand, which was Etchall reusable etching creme and Cadence Magic Glass. Overall both work well in combination with silkscreen stencils, but let's look at the stats, shall we? Etchall reusable etching creme Cadence Magic Glass Price $24.99 (about 24.25 Euros) 19.99 Euros (about $22.15) (via Etchall website, shipping not included) (on our web shop, shipping not included) Bottle content 118 ml / 4 US fl. Oz. 59 ml / 2 US fl. Oz. Reusable Yes No* (depends - see the update in text below) Waiting time 15 minutes 2 minutes Etching result Good Good Can be used on other Yes No surfaces As you can see both have pros and cons. Etchall is more expensive and the etching process takes significantly longer than with Cadence (especially if you only have one stencil to work with!). However, it's reusable so it'll last way longer. And you can use it to etch other surfaces besides glass, mirrors, and windows. I haven't tested it (yet), but it says you can use it on porcelain, slate, and marble as well. Cadence on the other hand works a lot faster and is less expensive (in the short term), but it does go down the drain after that first use. *Update - I have actually since this experiment reused Cadence etching cream when I was doing another bulk etching session. So you can't save the used etching cream for later, but you can still reuse it if you reuse it straight away (multiple times even). When I was testing I generally applied the Cadence etching cream first on one jar and let it sit. By the time I had applied the Etchall creme to the other jar, my Cadence jar would be ready to be rinsed off, cleaned and dried - done! Then I was left waiting for the Cadence stencil to dry (as it does need to be cleaned and dried in between uses) and waiting for the Etchall creme to cure and do it's thing. Hence how the afternoon of testing turned into a two day kind of ordeal. Do note though that I only had one stencil for each brand available, so waiting in between uses was inevitable. I would imagine you could easily work out a smooth system for both brands using a small number of stencils and a few alarm set on your phone. What that magic number is, I don't know (yet). Which brings me to the final question... One stencil - how many etchings??? I don't know. That's right, I said it: I still don't know! I was expecting to get about 8 etchings out of each stencil, which was perfect as the jars I got cam in an 8 pack. But the stencils were fine after 8 etchings (and 8 washes). So I went back to the shop the next day and bought another 8 jars. Guess what, the stencils are still holding up after another 8 etchings and washes. And that goes for both brands of etching creams. By now, both stencils have been through 16 washes, which is what I think is starting to wear on them (not the etching cream, but the washing). After about the first 8 washes, they started to want tot curl up before the transparent carrier sheet was applied again. They're not big so they're more likely to curl up after that many uses. And I stretched the Etchall all stencil on the side a bit when I was trying to peel it off the glass jar early on in the process. No big deal as the design didn't get stretched, but now the stretched side won't stay on the carrier sheet and so the adhesive on that spot dries out quickly. I don't know how many more etchings I'd be able to get out of them, but I've run out of jars, time, and patience for now. All in all, 16 etchings for one stencil is not a bad result at all. A recent customer of ours got about 8 etchings out of one stencil (she did nearly 50 etchings!). Her stencils were more detailed, though. And even though she thinks she's still able to get some more out of some of them, she was having trouble with the adhesive not working anymore. As I was doing my testing, I noticed that if I left my stencils out in the sun for too long, the adhesive would also dry out. A quick fix to this is to breathe onto the back of the stencil right before you stick it onto your surface. The moisture of your breath will be just enough to re-activate the adhesive. Alternatively, you could dab the back of your stencil with a damp cloth after yo take the clear carrier sheet off. To get the most out of your stencils when etching I would also suggest a different approach to cleaning your stencils. Usually, I suggest running it under warm (not hot) water and gently rubbing the front of the stencil with your fingers to remove any paint. In the case of etching, however, you rinse off the cream while the stencil is still on the glass surface. Rub it gently, while wearing gloves, while ti's on the glass. Then take off the stencil and simply hold it adhesive side up under some gently running water (not full blast). Then flip it over, right side facing you, and rinse it that way. No rubbing needed, just let the water do the job. If you're more of a visual type of learner, I made a short video of the whole etching project. Click here to see the video. the take-away Both Etchall and Cadence did great. I easily got 16 etchings out of each stencil with these brands.
I would highly recommend using more than one stencil if you're planning to etch more than 3 glasses (or if you're just very impatient) because you do need to wait for the stencils to dry in between etchings. Also, which brand to go with depends on your purpose/personal preference. If you're planning to do a bunch of etchings just one time, like a single project, then go with Cadence. It's quicker and with a couple of duplicate stencils you can churn out a decent amount of customized glasses. If you're doing a bunch in one go, then you can actually scrape off the excess etching cream and reuse this straight away on the next item to be etched. As long as you reuse the etching cream straight away, you can actually reuse it, you just can't save it for later once it's been used. If you're a dedicated crafter, however, who will be etching again and again (and perhaps on different surfaces too), then go with Etchall. Just do yourself a favor and have duplicate stencils and a system set up, so you don't forget about your etching projects and let them sit for longer than 15 minutes. I accidentally lost track of time a couple of times with Etchall, since the wait is longer and I did other stuff in between. But know that letting them sit for 25 minutes instead of 15 once or twice won't do any damage to your stencils. Now over to you, let me know if you liked this post. And if you have any questions let me know in the comments below. I'd love to hear from you! Until next time, happy crafting!
1 Comment
Annmarie Mc Guinness
10/1/2022 12:43:34
Thank you Mariette, I received my Cadence cream today. Im very excited to start using it for some projects. I will keep you updated with mt progress xo
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AuthorHi, I'm Mariette. I love crafting and make custom reusable silkscreen stencils, which I sell on our Etsy shop - SmartScreenStencils. ArchivesCategories |