mwdesigncreate

Is there such a thing as an affordable laminator?.... other than the Big Squegee? Im in the market for a 24" cold laminator, nothing fancy, just one that works. I can't believe how much they are! Comparison: I could buy a used car, probably one that will drive for a couple years.... or I could buy a low-grade laminator... If anyone has, or knows anyone who's looking to sell a 24" or similar size laminator for a decent price, Let me know! my email is mwdesigncreate@yahoo.com Thanks,

Does anyone actually use the edge sealer markers/pens? If so, what do you use it for? (such as vehicle graphics, window graphics, boat graphics, etc..?) I've worked for 2 different sign shops, never used one, just wondering how commonly they are used, if at all? If I did some lettering/graphics for a boat, would it be a good idea to use one with all the water and all? Thanks to everyone!

Been trying for 3 days now to do a successful contour cut job with no success. Using a Laserpoint 24", SignCut Productivity Pro, on a Mac computer. I've calibrated it probably 50 times so far through SignCut, and still no luck! I know I have the page in the cutter the right way. I'm using the "3 point registration," but every time, it cuts pretty far off from where it should be cutting. I've even adjusted the X and Y scale on the machine itself to read the same number, as this fixed someone else problems, but not mine. What else can I do???!!! Seems like I've tried everything. Obviously the calibration is not correct, but every time I try to calibrate it, it does the same thing. It shouldn't be this difficult to use a relatively simple procedure. I'm open to any and ALL suggestions at this point. Could the problem be that I'm not using this "keyspan" thing I've heard about? Cutting regular vinyl seems to work fine, but contour cutting around a design is another story. HELP!

Hello all, Customer of mine needs a black banner with white lettering. Size is 36" x 60".....I'm having trouble tracking down black banner material in that size. Everything seems to be pre-grommeted, which is fine, but not when I'd need to cut it down for the size I need and have weird grommet placement as a result! Anyone know where i can order some plain black banner material, preferably with no grommets already in it?, and without having to but 120 feet of it? Any links, leads, or ideas where to look would be sooooo appreciated!!! Thank you all

Need help figuring out a price for the following: Plotter-cut on reflective white vinyl... size of the entire graphic is 80" x 24", entire graphic will also be pre-masked for the customer to apply. No actual printing being done, just plotter cutting. I know reflective white vinyl is REALLY expensive!!! Any help/advice on pricing would be a HUGE help to me, so again, thank you all!

I priced them at $2.50 a piece. So for the whole job, 100 white decals, and 100 black decals, the total for the whole job would be $500

Anyone heard of the PrismJet DT printer before? It's made by Mutoh. They have it in Signwarehouse's newest catalogue that I got in the mail, but it's literally nowhere to be found online. Signwarehouse does not have it on their website, and I can't find any info about it elsewhere either! Looks like this thing is pretty comparable to a Gerber Edge set-up, only it's an inkjet, not thermal printer. If anyone has any info, or has found any web links to find out more about it, that would be awesome! Thanks everyone!

I'm not set up as a legal business yet, so I've just been doing cash paid jobs when I can get them. If I want to start approaching other businesses to do work for them, do I need to be set up as a legal business to work with them? or can they cut me a check for each job I do for them without claiming it on their business taxes? Just wondering because of the whole taxes thing... Any insight on this would be a huge help! Thanks everyone,

Hello all! Anyone know if I can do some printing(labels & such) for businesses, but not be set up as a legal business myself? The thing is, is that I do some printing & vinyl work from home on the side for the extra cash, but would like to try to land some bigger, more regular work from other businesses. Can I do this, without being slapped with some big tax bill at the end of the year.... or anything like that? or do I NEED to be set up as a real business? Any advice on this would be great. Thanks,

I would do it for $2 a piece. If you're unsure, call up a couple of label printers, or sign shops in your area, and tell them what you're looking for and just ask for a ballpark estimate, that way you're not driving your potential business to other companies who can do it cheaper in your area. $2.75 seems a bit high.... at least around here where I live.

Tell him that you'll only do it if he can give you written permission from the company that the logo belongs to. If he can't, then you'll have to politely tell him that you can't risk being sued over it. I've done it a few times myself. If they REALLY want it done, they'll call or write the company to obtain written permission to use their logo, and 9 out of 10 times, the company will say yes, because it's free advertising for them. If you need further varification, call the company and make sure that they did in fact obtain that permission.

get it printed on vinyl, then apply it to the coroplast. It'd be MUCH cheaper, so you can make an actual profit on it. Heck, I could print it for you at $20 per print ($40 for 2 prints to make it double sided). If you need any printing done, let me know. You can email me at mwdesigncreate@yahoo.com

Hello everyone, Anyone have any vectors of pistons? I'm looking for a skull & cross pistons, but I already drew a nice skull, but my attempts at drawing pistons are not so good! Looking for the good stuff, not ametuer "live trace" drawings, unless it looks really good! If anyone is looking for other vector drawings, I'm willing to trade/give some to you too. Thanks everyone!

Hello all, Having a hard time getting the contour cutting on my laserpoint 24" to work correctly. Using my own reg marks on my prints didn't work. I have SignCut Productivity Pro, not X2. From all the reading on the forum I've done, looks like a need a template with the pre-drawn registration marks to get it going correctly. And yes, I calibrated the "laserpoint offset" several times. For some reason I don't have the sample files the were supposed to come with SignCut. So would anyone be kind enough to send me some of these sample templates? I would be very greatful to anyone that could help, and point me in the right direction. Thank you thank you thank you!!!!! My email is mwdesigncreate@yahoo.com

Hello all! Does anyone know how I would price a job using customer supplied vinyl to inkjet print on? Customer wants me to print on specialty type of vinyl. I would be printing using my Epson Stylus Pro 7600 wide format inkjet printer. My best guess would be to price it based on ink usage, but how do I do that? It comes out to cost me $0.61 (61 cents) per mL of ink used..... but how do I know how much ink will be used based in milliliters from an inkjet printer? ANY help or helpful suggestions would be a HUGE help!!! Thank you all again!

$68 is the price I came up with

I priced it at $235. Anything in the $200-$300 range would be fair market price.

For the 18 x 11.5 decal, I came up with a price of $14.49 per decal For the 6 x 3.5 decal, I came up with $1.50 per decal. For the smaller one, I'd tell them to have it printed, maybe on clear vinyl, because it's WAY to detailed and will cause too much wear & tear on the cutter.

I work for a FastSigns franchise location. It's the one of the biggest one in the world, in terms of sales and equipment. The owner is pretty rich, has 3 kids that he put through college and a wife that goes shopping as her full time profession. Must be nice! Make no mistake about it, he works like a dog, lots of hours, but he's good at what he does. It took him years to get where he's at, but obviously it's paid off. When you buy a franchise, you get the name, unlimited tech support, discount pricing from distributors/manufacturers, marketing, and so on... but you pay the corporation a nice fee for it though.

Hello All! Can anyone recommend a decent type/brand of vinyl to use for printing labels/stickers for a wide format printer? I would be printing the labels on an Epson Stylus Pro 7600 (ultrachrome model). It's a 24" wide format printer, & contour cutting them on the laserpoint 24" cutter. Any specifics and brands would be a huge help!!! If you have a link to a website that sells it too, that would be even better!!! It doesn't have to be the super high grade vinyl media, but rather just a mid-grade vinyl. Thanks everyone

Hello All, What would you guys charge per decal for the following? -Digitally printed square shaped decal -Size is 48" x 24" -UV laminated -Premasked Customer will install. They're going on a trailer. Will be a total of 3 of them printed. I came up with a price of $128 per decal.... curious to see what other might charge to see if I'm charging too much... or too little! Thanks,

For banners, I would only use a spray laminate like Frog Juice. Don't try to use a regular lamination... it looks bad and it won't stay on it for long. Normally, you don't need to use any kind of laminate for banners, but if you must, use Frog Juice, it works good. Pigment ink already is made for outdoor use... some companies refer to pigment inks as UV inks because they are more weather/fade resistant.

Looks awesome! What's that font called?

What size is that magnet? Just curious because I have a job coming up that looks about that size for a pickup truck, wondered if I should order the pre-cut magnet sheets, or a full roll of it... Looks really nice by the way too! Good job!

Contrary to what the others told you, you can find pretty good used wide-format inkjet printers (look for a used HP brand inkjet) for a few thousand dollars, then buy a vinyl cutter/plotter that has the "contour cutting" feature like the ones on this website. The US Cutter brand has a couple models with the contour cutting feature, for very decent prices. I found a really nice used HP large format printer on craigslist for $2500, and bought a US Cutter brand vinyl cutter for just over $500, so for $3000 I got a small business started. Then about a thousand more for other supplies like vinyl, ink, tools, and so on. Believe it or not, with $5000, you can get a pretty nice setup going. You just have to be patient and REALLY watch for good deals on used printers. MAKE SURE that the printer uses UV inks, so you can print outdoor stuff, as well as indoor stuff. If you're going to be doing things like vehicle wraps, you'll need a laminator..... which are usually more expensive than the printer and the vinyl cutter... which sucks.