More about K-etching Up - Electro-etching Copper

I had forgotten about using embossing powder with my etching and decided to try etching with my electric device with it to see if it stayed on longer. It sure did! It was perfect - none of it came off during the etching process! But the powder I used was rather chunky...couldn't find my detail powder for this attempt so I'll have to go hunting for it soon! I lost a lot of the detail because the embossing powder was a little too thick. Or maybe a little too much Versamark ink....

This is how it looked after I melted some sparkly embossing powder on it.

I set up my device like last time and let it go for over an hour this time, checking it periodically. I had to add some more salt because it didn't seem like it was etching much, and it did help.

This is after etching, fresh out of the container. I wanted to show how deep the etch was.

It's a little hard to tell the depth because of how thick the embossing powder is but I was happy!

Then I tried to get the embossing powder off. In another post I was told lacquer thinner would do the trick but all I have is some nail polish remover. It didn't exactly remove it, although some came off and it got kind of brittle. I then found a straight razor blade and used it to scrape the embossing powder off...it came off in big sheets, as you can see from the picture! Whole flowers and lace...it was much easier than trying to remove it with the nail polish remover, I gotta say!

You can see entire embossing powder flowers on the paper plate, to the right.

This is after scraping off the embossing powder, before sanding. It lost some of the detail in the stamp, but I'll do better next time. It was so shiny on the unetched parts!

After sanding, before patina. Very happy with the depth of the etch! 

Glad to know that using embossing powder works SO well! Next time I will find my detail powder, I think it will do a better job of keeping the fine detail in my stamped etchings.

After patina.

For instance...the detail on this one...!

This is the other side of the sheet of copper I just showed you.

The picture above is the result of the last time I etched with my electrical device, using the Stazon ink. If the ink hadn't come off, it would have been an amazing etch! The detail in it is perfect! Maybe when I find my detail powder it will look as nice. But you can see how shallow the etching is...the ink was coming off so fast I just stopped my experiment. But it is still very pretty. :)

I used a different embossing powder for the one below, a gold detail powder, and it wasn't as easy to remove as the glittery, crusty one was. It did, however, give a much more detailed result. It did come off, with some elbow grease, with the nail polish remover...and a razor blade. I guess it depends on the brand. I am much happier with this etch, even if I didn't stamp it perfectly. :) The embossing powder worked MUCH better than the plain ink using the electrolytic etch! It held perfectly onto the metal. I still have to test my setup with some PnP but for now, this is a great substitute.

The edges are rounded, but sharp. It's quite deep!

This final picture is of a piece of my aluminum sheet metal that I tried to etch. In one of the sites I read they said you could etch aluminum with this electric method, so I decided to try it with the embossing powders. I used a Zing purple detail powder on it and let it go in my setup for about an hour and a half. At first I tried using my scrap copper but didn't see any reaction so I changed it to a piece of the sheetmetal. There was some kind of aluminum colored jelly on top of the copper residue (didnt wash out the container very well) after etching for that long and I got worried about some kind of poison gas being released by this so I stopped it. Better safe than sorry! I tried using nailpolish remover on the embossing powder and all it did was remove the purple dye :) so I scraped the melted powder off with my razor blade....you can see the scratch marks in the picture. It does not look actually "etched"...the exposed parts look more "deteriorated" than etched. :D But it still looks kind of cool, right? Thus ends this experiment! :)

Too bad I scratched it up! I may try using a colored pencil on it...

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