Gaining 100% Accuracy on cut - Replace with flatbed plotter maybe?

[Ceefree]

I'm looking to improve the quality of our cut. Currently using the GX24 (Now rarely) and the SP300v for cutting only. We are doing very intricate cuts such as mobile phone wraps etc. We get issues such as

- Circles often don't join, example.. (Ignore my paint skills!)

Circle Example

• Ceefree
• Feb 21, 2021

- Weeding is a chore! we would leave some of it to the customer but often it doesn't cut deep enough depending on the thickness of the material, which snaps if too thick, or accuracy isn't the best, and lines get missed or circles don't join as above
- The shinier the material the less accurate the cut!
- The longer the cut the less accurate!

Wondering if I should quit on these plotters and try to find a flatbed solution. Or whether we can achieve 100% accuracy by persevering with what we have. In all honesty, not sure if the comp is lurking but their quality is smashing ours out of the water. Have done larger cuts for 5+ years but these new small intricate cuts are a stumbling block

 

[balstestrat]

So you have probably an old cutter, has it ever been serviced? Then you have a p&c combo which is at best when doing p&c work and at worst a cutter. Same thing, has it had any service to it?
If you had a proper cutter you shouldn't have any issues like that. Summa, graptech etc. Roll cutter is fine.
Now then there's the special stuff like what do you actually mean with "shiny material"? Do you mean glossy vinyl or reflective?

You really only gain from the flatbed cutter if you want to do through cut. Just buy a real roll cutter...

 

[Ceefree]

Hi balstestrat

Firstly we bought the SP300v in good faith from supplier as a P&C not knowing about the maintenence requirements and quickly realised we didn't yet have the infrastructure or laminator for print so scrapped the idea. As we didn't use the print functionality and the weekly cleaning not being sufficient we kept on having to call out an engineer to swap the captops, service company not being too happy we ended up losing our service contract at the end of last year so the last service was in October just gone. It's just been an expensive cutter ever since.

Re shiny material. This is meaning glossy, we have a few and some are less accurate than others. Such as High gloss carbon which is chinese generic, or 3m Di Noc which is quite thick and shiny

 

[balstestrat]

Yeah I mainly meant as servicing the cutter side, blade holder, pinchwheels, blade, cutting strip etc. But like said, only one of those is actual cutter and the 2nd is just a bad one.

Anyways if you want a flatbed with a belt you are probably looking to start at the smallest most basic models £40,000++
Summa F is a great starter.

 

[Ceefree]

Is Summa s2 comparable https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/Summa-S2...-/203237874444?_trksid=p2349624.m46890.l49292

 

[iPrintStuff]

Are you using cut only vinyls? No printing at all?

if so, the shine on glossy media shouldn’t be an issue as there’s no marks to read.

Sounds a lot like you should just invest in a decent roll cutter, the p&c machines usually have ok cutters but if you get a summa/graph tech your cuts will be a lot better and easily 3x quicker.

Also worth noting, I’ve always found that cheaper vinyl is harder to weed.

 

[Ceefree]

No printing at present as we don’t have the infrastructure. I’m going to at least try to get a demo of a summa cutter.

funnily the material that’s giving us most jip is the 3m Dinoc

 

[Jester1167]

DiNoc is somewhat thick and a different composition to the regular cut vinyl. A normal 45" blade should cut through, but you might try a 60 deg blade. Good blades stay sharper longer, and they aren't cheap. The cheap ones on Amazon are cheap for a reason. Probably due to inferior steel, sharpening and QC.

Typically when the blade doesn't close a shape, it's because you have the blade offset set wrong. Offset is the difference between the rotational center of the blade and the cutting point. Your cutter manual and specific blades used will dictate the offset.

Offset images: https://www.google.com/search?q=plo...Cg&bih=1457&biw=3840&rlz=1C1DKCZ_enUS791US791