We have studied the spreading of Fe, Co, and Ni from a dot deposited onto a W(110) substrate. A Cu cap layer covering dot and surface is found to change the fast spreading directions for all three metals to <100>. This is in contrast to the spreading without a cap layer where the fast spreading direction is either along <110> in the case of Fe or influenced by the step directions on the substrate surface for Co and Ni. The cap layer induced spreading anisotropy is proposed to be caused by the structure in the alloy layer formed during the spreading process.