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Question Is there a comparison study on vinyl cutter registration systems? (ARMS vs OPOS vs barcode, etc)

dsstrainer

New Member
Hey all..

I'm looking to get a vinyl cutter. I already have a printer and a laminator

My workflow will be
1. Print on my printer with registration marks/barcode/whatever (via Flexi)
2. Laminate with my laminator
3. Line up the marks with the cutter and have it contour cut from Flexi

I did buy a 28" saga vinyl cutter with ARMS and it works sometimes but somewhat clunky and unreliable.
1. Sometimes it would find the first few registration marks but fail on the last.
2. ARMS doesn't actually work at all but ARMS PLUS does.
3. It was extremely hard to load in a wide page like 24"+ wide and keep it exactly lined up as there are no real media loading guides
4. The claim of 28" is really max media width. If using ARMS it needs to overscan the lines by about an inch and the registration marks are another inch off the graphic so the max cuttable width is like 21" reliably which is too small for what I need.
5. The ARMS scan requires you to have some leading and trailing material in the page for the pinch rollers to hang on to so you really need to have like 4-5" in front of and behind the graphic which is such a waste over time.

All in all it works but really hard to get to line up reliably, especially with larger graphics.

So I'd like to know what is a better option as far as the optical scanning systems out there and which are easier to work with. I know Graphtec, Summa, and Roland are popular but do they have a better more reliable system.. I've read about Summa OPOS and some barcode options but which of these are easiest as far as being able to quickly put a larger print into the machine and have it aligned in 20 secs and go?
 

victor bogdanov

Active Member
I use graphtec fc9000, takes 5 seconds extra to load a print for cutting vs just loading regular vinyl for cutting. I have never had an issue reading the barcodes or registration marks.
 

CanuckSigns

Active Member
We have a graphtec fc8600 and it works great 95% of the time, on occasion it will just flat out refuse to read the marks, doesn't even ettempt to read them. We had a job where I was cutting 20 identical sheets, 19 were perfect, 1 wouldn't read the marks no matter what I did.

We also have a summa f1612 with the camera system, it has been flawless for the last 2 years. The camera is more robust, since you can see through the camera on screen, you can use it even on hard to read media (clear, reflective etc)
 
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