CCSupras

Awesome! I did this SAME logo taken from the boost gauge of my '89/'90 Toyota Supra! I love this logo, not sure why. Was one of the first things I vectorized. Dave

Not sure where their closest warehouse is to you, but Fellers has any color you can imagine. www.fellers.com

Totally forgot I had even signed up for this web site, they usually send stuff in a hurry, hopefully I'll get a new color chart. Mine is worn out. Thanks for reminding me about Oracal's member site!

I personally feel that I've exhausted the avenues available to me in the course of this diagnosis. Unless there are any other suggestions from kenimes or another member of this community, I'm willing to try for the blade holder swap out. I await your suggestions. Thanks for all the help and tolerance of my noobish ways in the few posts I've made.

They're so tiny it would most likely require a high resolution DSLR camera to capture this, to which I do not have at my disposal. I have illustrated what it does in the "square" test pattern below. It's not to scale, but it should give an idea of what is happening. I've illustrated in black the "area of error." This is an approximation of what happens with the blade. It basically appears that the blade does not return to it's starting position with closing a shape. Keep in mind, this happens even when I hit the "test" button on the plotter in off-line mode and it does it almost exactly the same every time. I assume this eliminates the software settings for "offset" since it's an internal operation of some type. I hope that makes sense. I'm not trying to sound like I know what I'm talking about, I'm just doing my best to describe what is happening with my limited plotter knowledge. Thanks for the suggestions and help so far.

kenimes, I think you've turned me on to something. I checked the blade holder, the blade appears snug, but has some radial play. So, I decided to stick the pen in there and run a couple tests and "cut" a small job. It appears that every thing is okay when using the pen, but for some reason, the blade creates the slight "tags" or "overcuts" or whatever you want to call them. The results appear below. Click the low resolution image to get a FULL sized version to see the detail of the cut/trace. So, the two blocks on the left are when I hit the test button. Current settings are pressure 140, cut speed 40, and blade depth is basically what it's always been. I was originally cutting too deep when I first got the cutter, but I seemed to have remedied that part a month or two ago. The pen does NOT appear to have problems with closing shapes. Could I have a defective blade holder? It's hard to see how much play there is in the blade when it's fully retracted, but if I pop it out some it does have a minor bit of radial (side-to-side) play. In hindsight, I probably shouldn't have used the same pressure for the pen as the blade, but unsure as to the proper settings for that off hand. I'll refrain from anymore pen testing until I can confirm some proper pressure settings for the pen holder.

LaserPoint 24" USCutter here. Since I've had it, I've never been able to make cuts close properly. I cut Oracal 651 pretty much exclusively. I've followed NUMEROUS instructionals on this fourm. This forum has been nothing but a wealth of information for me. I'm running Signblazer, the offset is .25, my cut speed is currently 40, pressure is currently 140. Most stuff cuts & weeds beautifully. If it's a large enough area, the slight little "miss" when closing a cut doesn't really make a difference. The details however suffer from time to time. I've adjusted the speeds from 20-50, the pressures from 70-170. All seems to be the same story. The blade is just barely out of the blade holder, but cuts through the vinyl and leaves the backing unscathed. You can just see a tiny trace on the backing when you remove the sticker. Here's the kicker, even when i hit the "test" button on the front panel, it still doesn't close the cut. So I don't think it's a software issue. However, I could very well be doing something wrong, but I've done everything I can imagine from reading the forums for days. I've had the cutter a few months now, extremely happy with it, I've just finally had some time in the evenings to devote trying to fix this issue and have hit the proverbial brick wall. Any suggestions? I'd call in for support, but this is mostly an after hours hobby thing for me, so unless they're around after 5:30pm central time or on a weekend...I can't really get away from work to "play with my plotter." hehehe. Hopefully it's just me doing something silly.

First off, thanks for the encouraging words from the members here. I'm glad you all like it. They may end up on eBay. Right now my focus is directly to the community in need of them. I'm a fan of Supras, I own Supras, so my interest in this project is personal. Yes, I'd like to make a few bucks in the end, but I feel good making what was once unavailable, available again. I've got a friend here that has one of each generation of Supra ('81, '84, '92, and '98.) So we're using his as models. Once I've got all the different things perfected, I might put them up on eBay. I do see lots of vehicle themed items on eBay, and I will probably join those ranks once the designs are "perfected." I hope it does some good. I'm working on a two color version of the MKI and MKII logos this week. Hopefully I'll have another car to stick them on, otherwise my refrigerator is looking a bit plain so it might be time to annoy the wife. I would probably just sell using my current eBay and merchant account. I had a nasty experience with PayPal years ago, and will never, ever, use them for anything again. I only have an account to pay people whom I buy stuff from, but I will never use them to receive money again and I will never attach them to my primary checking account again.

I haven't made many posts here, but I did mention a couple times I'd be making replica decals and such for older cars and such. My focus is the Toyota Supra (and Celica) from the mid-late 70s all the way up to the 1998 Supra when the model was discontinued in the US. A friend of mine, with his trusty '81 Supra successfully (at least I think so) made a replica of the old door graphics that were available. His car did not originally have them, but we were able to obtain a picture from a forum member that looked like this: I proceeded to trace and manipulate it, but it came out a bit skewed. (On the bottom below). After my eyes had rolled into the back of my head and my fingers turned into putty at about 2AM, my buddy took over with some Photoshop and was able to correct the incorrect aspect ratio of the original trace. (In the middle below). Then I woke up well refreshed after my 15-20 minute nap on the futon in my office, and was able to come up with the outline for the Supra logo. (On the top below). The dragon is a stylized take on the original Celica Supra dragon that I found on the Internet years ago and vectorized. I plan to vectorize the original as well, since that's what the purists will want. Then it was finally time to print out the 46 inch version to go on the door! We attempted to install one of them using the dry app method at 3:30am. Needless to say it was an epic failure. He borrowed my truck, went home, and returned the following after noon and we did a sensible wet app install and I am very happy with the results. click the above pic for a high res version We didn't get around to getting the hood painted for the shots, but I was too excited to hold them back until it's painted. Although the original decals were a two color (which I intended to replicate) he wanted to have an outlined version with the color of the car showing through. It added a bit to the weeding phase of the job, but in the end, I think it was well worth the effort. Hope you guys enjoy this.

Hello everyone, I read just about every post I could here before purchasing my USCutter Laserpoint 24, and for about a week of ownership, I've been VERY happy. Only a couple more runs with it and I'll be ready to start slinging vinyl to locals and "my" market. I'll primarily be doing stickers for my car club, Crescent City Supras, and probably other enthusiasts in this same genre. Hope to make enough money to at least pay for this cutter and my vinyl in the end. Although from reading here a lot I almost fear that this cutter I just bought might be a part time job. This forum has been a priceless wealth of information for choosing my cutter, solving my initial (but few) setup problems, and I hope to be around to contribute to others as well. Thanks for such a great forum. Attached is my latests run of stickers, strictly for entertainment value.

Well, after much debating, discussion, and what not, I actually did the eBay thing for a LaserPoint 24. I can deal with the 6 month warranty since there is an availability of spare parts. The contour cutting feature will probably not be used at first, but eventually I'll probably wish I had it. Plus the stand look so much nicer on the LP24. It'll be stylish in my crowded home office. Can't wait the get the plotting cutter, thanks for the reassurement. Hopefully it'll ship soon enough for me to have it Friday, but I doubt it. Washington is a far place from Louisiana. Oh well, I'll be excited when it arrives either way. You guys'll be seeing a lot of me around here I'm sure. Thanks again for the help!

Hey all, new guy here, name's Dave. I represent a local Toyota Supra club, and we do a bit of promotional stickers for cars at road races, shows, etc... Have also done some for other clubs too, but outsourced everything. It's getting nit picky down here in the bayou land to get small jobs done. People keep hitting me for proofing charges on small runs or must order a large quantity of stickers. I've got access to a sign shop, that's a customer of mine, but it's completely out of the way (~50mi from my home) and only available during the same hours I work. Frankly, the money I'd waste in these fees or taking off work could easily just buy a cutter/plotter. If I order a plotter, I'll probably approach the other clubs who have the same issues I've been met with, and try to make a few extra bucks (to at least pay for the plotter). I'm a very avid computer guy, pretty good at Photoshop, kinda new to Illustrator and Inkscape...but have been toying with them the last few days. Here's what I'm looking to do. Mostly just stickers, occasionally a windshield banner, and some body graphics here and there. One day may venture into cutting t-shirt vinyl if the stickers drum up enough cash for a press. I can't imagine I'd ever cut window tint, but whatever. That's about it really. It's not going to be high volume. Well, the first two weeks probably will be, because I'll be cutting everything under the sun that I can vectorize because it's a "new toy." I'd venture to say everyone's first cutter lives a very hard first couple of weeks. Will the MH721 25" (I believe it's a "Refine") do this with ease? I prefer the serial communication because I'm just about OUT of USB ports on the main computer here, and it's got two serial ports, only one of which is in use to control a ham radio. So that'll be fine. USB or LPT is also available if need be. Any assuring advice, or why I shouldn't go with the MH721, is welcomed. I am a *very* technically inclined person. I do the computer thing (network engineering) for a living, so things like COM port settings and what not do not scare me. Finally, I'd like to say that this forum has been an INVALUABLE resource to me in researching the purchase of a cutter, and if I decide to do this, I'll be buying from USCutter either way solely based on the level of community AND manufacturer support that is put out in this forum. You guys do an awesome job here, and I hope I can contribute eventually. Until then, you'll have to help this newbie out. Thanks in advance for any advice. I'll be vectorizing some more Supra related logos and text as I impatiently await your responses.