The Ultimate Guide: Ironing Vinyl Onto Wood

This guide covers ironing heat transfer vinyl onto stained, painted and finished wood surfaces. I did 18 tests, so you don’t have to.

So Many Questions

Have you ever wondered what would happen when you apply iron on (heat transfer) vinyl on to wood? Have you ever wondered what would happen if the wood was painted, stained, or had a finish on it already? Did you ever try to iron on a design with smaller, narrower font and have it wrinkle, shrink, or just flake off? If so, you’re in the right place because I was wondering the same things and decided to test them so you wouldn’t have to.

Jump to Experiments

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Why HTV on Wood?

The first time I ever ventured into the world of iron on was actually to iron vinyl onto a crib board my husband made for his friend. The text was tiny and I thought I would have a better shot at clean lines if I ironed on the writing.

I used Siser HTV for this and honestly the result was good. I used my household iron and did short intervals of heat and pressure, checking the design intermittently.

That’s where my success ended. I decided to try to seal my design with a coat of spray lacquer. I sprayed it on and then came back to a wrinkled peeling mess. After that I just stencilled my designs on.

For Christmas this year my husband bought me the Cricut Easy Press II. I was hoping that this would lead to greater HTV success, so I took to the internet with my questions:

• What is the best vinyl to iron on to wood?
• Can you iron on to painted surfaces?
• Does it matter what type of paint?
• Can you iron on to stained surfaces?
• Can you iron on to finished wood surfaces?
• Can you put a finish over HTV on wood to seal your designs?
• What finish works best on HTV?
• Should I used a household iron or easy press for this?
• What sizes of font can you iron on?

Overall I found mixed reviews. Some used Cricut Everyday Iron On, some preferred Siser Easy Weed. There wasn’t a lot of specific instructions for how long to press and what temperature to use and there wasn’t much out there about what finishes worked well overtop of the design.

I did see people ironing on over painted and stained surfaces, but nothing about the specifics. I most certainly could have just missed these posts, but I wanted to do some tests of my own and share them with all of you to set the record straight.

When successful heat transfer vinyl looks like it is painted on, can be sealed for lasting durability and takes just a fraction of the time to apply. Here are some of the projects I used HTV lettering over wood for:

I used Siser Easy Weed HTV for all of these projects and honestly I found ironing onto wood pretty finicky, often having to peel off spots and start again. Maybe this is because I used small skinny fonts, but I wanted to do more tests and find out for sure what the issue is and if I can do it better.

Cricut Instructions

The Cricut website states to that when using Everyday Iron On on a wooden surface you should:

• Set your easy press to 300° F
• Preheat the surface for 5 seconds
• Press with firm pressure for 40 seconds
• Peel slowly when cool

Siser Instructions

I checked the Siser website for instructions on how to use their Easy Weed HTV on wood, but couldn’t find any. Then I read the vinyl packaging and it doesn’t mention using it on wood. Go figure. There are definitely other people who use this vinyl on wood and my designs have been fairly successful, so I think it’s still in the running. They did say the following on their website when ironing onto fabrics:

• 305° F
• medium pressure
• 10-15 seconds
• hot or cold peel of carrier sheet

In the past when I have used Siser on wood I used 300° F, so I decided to stick with that for simplicity sake (especially because the above heat guide from Siser isn’t for wood). I also went longer because I found that the vinyl didn’t adhere at all after 15 seconds, so I started with 25 seconds. I liked the result from a hot peel, so I stuck with that.

Experiments

These tables outline my experiments with both types of vinyl using my Cricut Easy Press II. You could also use a household iron, but I wanted to be specific about temperatures and press times and my iron doesn’t give specific temperatures.

Below the table I have included pictures of my results on each surface – unfinished wood, wood painted with matte acrylic craft paint, wood painted with interior enamel in semi-gloss, stained wood, wood painted with glossy spray paint, and wood finished with satin polycrylic. I also compared my results based on whether it was text or an image and the size of font being used. In some categories when the results weren’t as good as I expected I did a second test with an alteration. All tests were done on 3/8″ sanded pine plywood scraps I had.

Abbreviations

• F – Farenheit
• sec – seconds
• ✔ (check mark) – vinyl went on well, no wrinkling or shrinking and adhered properly to the wood, or surface was unaffected by heat pressing

Disclaimer

My results may not be the same as yours. Results depend on how you personally peel off the carrier sheet, or how much pressure you use when pressing, or the type of iron you use. Everyone’s technique is a bit different. Feel pretty to share your results down below so we can learn from each other.

Cricut Everyday Iron On

Surface	Method	Smallest Font	Largest Font	Image	Surface	Other Results
Unfinished Test 1	300°F 5 sec Preheat 40 sec firm pressure cool peel	Size 22 Wrinkling Shrinking	Size 50 ✔	✔	✔	Adhesive visible around design
Unfinished Test 2	300°F 5 sec Preheat 40 sec firm pressure hot peel	Size 30 ✔	Size 50 ✔	✔	✔
Matte Acrylic Test 1	300°F 5 sec Preheat 40 sec firm pressure cool peel	Size 25 Didn’t adhere very well	Size 70 ✔	Some peeling up around bottom	✔
Matte Acrylic Test 2	300°F 5 sec Preheat 40 sec firm pressure hot peel	Size 30 ✔	Size 70 ✔	✔	✔	One Tiny wrinkle from my peeling technique
Glossy Interior Test 1	300°F 5 sec Preheat 40 sec firm pressure cool peel	Size 30 Didn’t adhere at all	Size 70 Didn’t adhere at all	Didn’t adhere at all	Hot and slightly tacky	I tried pressing it again for 20 seconds and doing a warm peel, but it failed
Glossy Interior Test 2	300°F 5 sec Preheat 40 sec firm pressure hot peel	Size 30 ✔	Size 70 ✔	✔	✔	Did better with hot peel, but be careful and go slow
Stained	300°F 5 sec Preheat 40 sec firm pressure hot peel	Size 30 ✔	Size 70 ✔	✔	✔
Spray Paint						Instantly melted and stuck to my easy press (with the preheat)
Polycrylic	300°F 5 sec Preheat 40 sec firm pressure cool peel	Size 30 ✔	Size 70 ✔	✔	✔	Started to come up a bit with the peel, but I was able to stick it down easily

Cricut Every Day Iron On – Unfinished Wood

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  Test 1

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  Test 1

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  Test 2

Cricut Everyday Iron On – Matte Acrylic Paint

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  Test 1

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  Test 1

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  Test 1

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  Test 2

Cricut Everyday Iron On – Interior Enamel Semi-Gloss Paint

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  Test 1

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  Test 1 – peeled up after cooling off

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  Test 2

Cricut Everyday Iron On – Stained Wood

Cricut Everyday Iron On – Spray Paint

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  Disaster

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Cricut Everyday Iron On – Satin Polycrylic

Siser Easyweed Heat Transfer Vinyl

Surface	Method	Smallest Font	Largest Font	Image	Surface	Other Results
Unfinished Test 1	300°F 5 sec Preheat 25 sec firm pressure hot peel	Size 22 Some shrinking	Size 50 Some shrinking	✔	✔	Really easy to weed
Unfinished Test 2	300°F 5 sec Preheat 20 sec firm pressure hot peel	Size 30 Didn’t adhere at all	Size 50 ✔	✔	✔
Matte Acrylic Test 1	300°F 5 sec Preheat 25 sec firm pressure hot peel	Size 25 Some shrinking & wrinkling	Size 70 ✔	✔	✔
Matte Acrylic Test 2	300°F 5 sec Preheat 25 sec medium pressure then 5 sec firm pressure hot peel	Size 30 ✔	Size 70 ✔	✔	✔	Added 5 sec firm pressure as I couldn’t peel off the sheet initially. The design became more matte.
Glossy Interior Test 1	300°F 5 sec Preheat 25 sec firm pressure hot peel	Size 30 Shrinking	Size 70 ✔	✔	✔	Could see purple adhesive around design
Glossy Interior Test 2	300°F 5 sec Preheat 40 sec firm pressure hot peel		Size 70 ✔			Tried 25 sec – design was coming up – went up to 40
Glossy Interior Test 3	300°F 5 sec Preheat 25 sec medium pressure hot peel	Size 30 Moved around	Size 70 Moved around	Wrinkled and shrunk	✔	Not very consistent
Stained	300°F 5 sec Preheat 40 sec firm pressure hot peel	Size 30 ✔	Size 70 ✔	Not as well adhered	✔	Tried 25 sec – design was coming up – went to 40 sec Design lost its shine
Spray Paint						Instantly melted and stuck to my easy press (with the preheat)
Polycrylic	300°F 5 sec Preheat 25 sec medium pressure hot peel	Size 30 ✔	Size 70 ✔	✔	✔	Design became matte

Siser Easyweed HTV – Unfinished Wood

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  Test 1

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  Test 2 – small font peeled off

Siser Easyweed HTV – Matte Acrylic Paint

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  Test 1

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  Test 2

Siser Easyweed HTV – Interior Enamel Semi-Gloss Paint

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  Test 1

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  Test 3

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  Test 2

Siser Easyweed HTV – Stained Wood

Siser Easyweed HTV – Satin Polycrylic

Impressions & Recommendations

Based on all this information there are a few things you should consider when choosing which HTV to use, temperature, hot or cool peel of transfer sheet, and duration of press.

• What size of font are you using
• Is your surface matte/unfinished or glossy
• The rest is a bit of give and take to try to get the results you want most as both options have pros and cons

Font Size

Font Size	Cricut Everyday Iron On	Siser Easyweed HTV
22-25	shrinks & wrinkles	shrinks & wrinkles
30-50	✔	✔
50+	✔	✔ (occasional shrinking)

Overall I had less wrinkling and shrinking with the Cricut Everyday Iron On, but the Siser Easyweed HTV did well with larger fonts. Both did well with the images. I think you would be less successful with narrower, smaller fonts.

Adherence to Different Surfaces

Surface	Cricut Everyday Iron On	Siser Easyweed HTV
Unfinished	✔	didn’t work as well
Matte Acrylic	✔ didn’t adhere as well	✔ some shrinking
Glossy Interior	✔ better with hot peel	✔, but didn’t work on third test
Stained	✔	✔
Spray Paint	Melted from easy press	Melted from easy press
Polycrylic	✔	✔

Pros and Cons

Cricut

• Performed well on matte and unfinished surfaces
• Tended to peel off the glossy surfaces – hot peel worked better for this but not 100% guaranteed not to wrinkle
• Images were quite successful to transfer, but text was a bit more difficult
• Sometimes the Everyday Iron On didn’t adhere as well
• Adjusting press time and switching to hot peel sometimes helped with adherence issues
• Didn’t shrink, shift or wrinkle as much as Siser Easyweed
• Larger ring of adhesive around design

Siser

• Performed well on matte and unfinished surfaces
• Inconsistent performance on glossy surfaces
• Shorter press time was better for the finished surfaces as there’s less risk of melting the paint
• Using too much pressure or pressing too long will definitely cause shifting, shrinking and wrinkling, especially with smaller fonts
• It works really well with large fonts and images, but not as great with small fonts
• Doing shorter presses checking in between can help with shrinking
• Using less pressure when pressing can help with shrinking, wrinkling, and shifting of the design
• Images were successfully transferred
• Smaller ring of adhesive around design

Well there you have it! You can definitely iron both of these types of Vinyl onto many different wood surfaces. Sometimes you just need to tweak when you peel the carrier sheet or how long you press for. Also remember that if it doesn’t work out, it’s pretty easy to scrape it off and try again, especially from a matte surface.

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Check out this post where I compared and tested how both types of vinyl do with different finishes/sealers on top of them.

I will also be posting to show how I used iron for the text on my reversible, interchangeable kitchen signs for tiered tray décor.

Keep Me Posted!

Let me know what your experiences are with HTV on wood. If you try anything different, or get different results, let me know. There are so many different factors to experiment with. Tag me on Instagram with your preferences or results @the_walnut_grove and pin this to Pinterest to refer back to.

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