darcshadow

Super Moderators
  • Content Count

    3,046
  • Joined

  • Last visited

  • Days Won

    207

Everything posted by darcshadow

  1. When you turn the cutter on, does the cutter heat raise up? If it's cutting all the move lines it sounds like your Z-axis function is not working. Common failure on a MH cutter, I would expect a Titan to be a little more robust, but it's a possibility.
  2. darcshadow

    MH 871-MK2 cutting across design

    On the plus side though, once you learn how to get decent cuts on an MH everything after will be a cake walk.
  3. If your connector is broke, as it appears in the photo, you'll want to get a new plug should be able to find one at any electronics part shop, or pull one off some old equipment, a computer power supply would have one. The brown wire should be your live or hot wire, blue is the neutral and yellow is ground. I believe this is the part, https://www.newark.com/qualtek-electronics/703w-00-04/power-entry-rcpt-15a-250vac-qc/dp/17B6838?mckv=sT8uYV23K_dc|pcrid|81515568741|plid||kword||match||slid||product|17B6838|pgrid|20376566901|ptaid|aud-106011026661:pla-325659265801|&gross_price=true&CATCI=aud-106011026661:pla-325659265801&CAAGID=20376566901&CMP=&CAGPSPN=pla&gclid=CjwKCAjw6-_eBRBXEiwA-5zHaUWrWmyIDlQu9hebl5KTY6AOgNv-I5fVpkEB_GlXfNjIDp2WqXPd_RoCjuoQAvD_BwE&CAWELAID=120185550003161657
  4. I would assume the LTR has the punch through tool, that is pretty much the main tool you'll need to create an image like this and have it be cut ready. Here's how I would do it, assuming you have the bull dog and skull design already. draw a red box, put the skull on top of the box and do a punch through. Next move the bull dog over the red box and move it to the bottom layer, the order drop down menu at the top of the window. Duplicate the red box (Number pad ++, then punch it through the bull dog. If you do a YouTube search on how to use the punch tool I'm sure you'll work out how to make this design. As goose said, this is a step above a beginner design but easy enough to learn.
  5. Assuming the white of the skull is just the white background of the page that is just one image stacked on top of a second image. If you're wanting to cut it you'll need to do a punch out (tool bar on the left of the screen) of the top image through the bottom so that all the lines that are hidden by the top image don't cut when you send it to the cutter.
  6. darcshadow

    Stacking Words

    I'm not clear on the effect your after? Do you have an example photo you could link to or post? My guess is you're talking about a drop shadow but I'm not sure.
  7. Are these old designs that have cut fine in the past? I'd say double check for stray nodes in the design.
  8. darcshadow

    RESET?

    While it can take longer, it's not as bad as it use to be and you can have several hundred or even a thousand fonts before you start to notice a real speed impact.
  9. darcshadow

    Computer help

    That computer is more than capable of running a cutter. Note, the main reason for keeping the cutting computer off the internet is most people's dedicated cutting computer is running an old OS, such as Windows XP. Since XP is no longer supported by MS, security patches are no longer pushed to the computer and it is at a greater risk of compromise. If you have a new computer with a current OS, there's no real need to keep it off the net.
  10. darcshadow

    LASERPOINT 3

    The quality of the graphic to start with can make a big difference as well. Was the image an auto trace? That will result in horrible results for fonts. I would say to post your file, but it can't contain any copyright protected stuff.
  11. What is really odd to me is the weed box cut just fine but the design is shifted. Probably going to have to call tech support on this one. Although first, have you tried different cutting software? Also, does it do the same if you turn off the weed box?
  12. Check you software for a setting. There should be a What You See is What You Get setting that will do as you want.
  13. darcshadow

    Customer service / orders

    Not to downplay your delay, but isn't it funny we're upset these days when an order doesn't show up in a week or less but 20 years ago you were happy to get a mail order delivery in 8 to 10 weeks. I couldn't imagine trying to run a small sign shop and having to plan supplies out that far in advance.
  14. Yeah, keep in mind, just because a file has a vector file extension, does not mean the image in the files is actually a vector.
  15. darcshadow

    Cutting Issues

    How are you setting your blade depth? If you're cutting too deep and cutting into the backing paper you don't have your blade depth set correctly.
  16. darcshadow

    Newbie Help

    I don't have one, but from what has been said on here the Titan 2 seems to be a pretty decent cutter. The advice I have to offer is don't be tempted by the package deals, unless you actually want everything in the package. Typically the package deals have several things that you don't need, want, or will use and the value of the package is not worth it. You'd be better off buying a few rolls of vinyl in the colors you know you want and then just buy additional colors as you need them. If you're wanting to do shirts, you'll want a press as well. Hobbyist claim you can use an iron, and while it is possible, you're not going to get good or lasting results and if you give the shirts out or sell them you're quality reputation will be hurt badly. The hardest thing most people have when jumping into this is wrapping their head around vector graphics. Most people only know raster graphics and vectors are a complete unknown. Look into vectors and get to know them a little now will help you quite a bit when you get equipment to start playing around with. Inkscape is a free and quite powerful vector program you can download and start playing around with till you get your hardware and what ever software comes with it.
  17. darcshadow

    DRV Error

    Is Vinyl Express even supported by Sign Blazer? Does your plotter have a serial port? If so, you should be able to use that port and get Sign Blazer to talk to it.
  18. darcshadow

    Import scale smaller than TurboCad drawing???

    while dxf is a vector, it can do some weird stuff when opened in a vector graphic program vs a cad program. Do you have any other export options from TurboCad? EPS would be ideal. PDF might work as well.
  19. darcshadow

    Borders WHEN designing Where do I Go?

    Sorry, but you do have to learn the very basics before we can be much help on here. Everyone has told you good information but I gather from your question of how to draw a box all the information they're giving you is over your skill level at this time. There are tons of great videos to get you started, or just start pushing buttons in the program and see what happens, that's usually how I learn a program. Once you can do the basics, then everyone on here will be more than happy to help with some tricks or more advanced techniques.
  20. darcshadow

    New computer suggestions

    to run the plotter and design software a 10 or 15 year old computer would work just fine so in today's standards anything off the shelf will do the job. As for video editing, the better the graphics card you can afford the better. The largest and fastest disk you can afford would also be good. A large SDD would be great. An array of SDDs might even be better but if you're not very computer savvy dealing with raided drives can be a bit to undertake. They're getting harder to find, but if you can find a computer with a serial port that'd be nice to have for the low to mid range plotters.
  21. darcshadow

    Borders WHEN designing Where do I Go?

    Go to youtube and look for some training videos. There are tons out there to help get you started down the right path.
  22. darcshadow

    Foam pad

    Even heat resistant stuff has a melting point. And did it say heat resistant on the package? The green foam I'm looking at online doesn't mention resistant, only fire retardant, meaning it won't burn easily.
  23. darcshadow

    New MH721 cutting way off of design

    If you make that exact same design only smaller, say 8", does it work? If so, then file size is NOT your problem. Yes, these cutters have limited memory, but it's not the physical size of the design being cut, it's the number of nodes in the design. I've cut some designs on mine with tons of nodes. the 1/8" tacking error you saw with the paper can be expected on long runs. I did a 6' stripe one and the start and stop points were off by about an 1/8, maybe even a 1/4". Since it was a simple stripe I just used a knife to even out the difference and unless you look really close you'd never notice it. You have something more than just tracking causing your problem, the GT and the 86 shouldn't be overlapping that bad even with bad tracking. Transfer speeds for plotters don't need to be fast. You're sending typically on a few hundred Kb of memory. Don't underestimate a good serial connection. They are old, but they're still around for a reason. They are extremely reliable and cheap to implement. The main draw back to them is transfer speed, but as I said, that is not much of an issue with the file sizes typical with vinyl cutters. A big advantage of serial is range, you easily run a 50' serial cable with no problems. USB, anything over 6' and you can start to have issues with the cheaper chipsets and 16'5" is the max length per the USB specifications.
  24. darcshadow

    Please Advise on Stencil Material

    I don't know of any adhesive vinyl that you'd be able to peal off and reuse. The act of pealing vinyl off causes the vinyl to stretch slightly, so even if you get it off without ripping it, it'll never look the same when you reapply it. Vinyl is cheap, and the cheap vinyl is good enough for what you are doing, just make a bunch of stencils, use them once and toss them. The time and hassle of trying to reuse is not worth the few penny's it cost to make a new one.
  25. darcshadow

    sign blazer

    Can it be done, Yes. Can it be done quickly and easily, No. Signblazer can export designs as EPS files that you can then open in most other vector programs but there is no automated way of doing this. Personally what I would do is keep signblazer around and if I ever need an old design I'd then find it and convert it to EPS. I wouldn't spend time converting every old design that I most likely will never need again. As for the fonts, they can be copied over to the new computer. I believe you can just copy them to the windows font folder and you're golden, I don't think you have to install each one individually.