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wayne1234

MH 871 good enough for small company wanting to do their own projects?

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I didnt get the feedback I was looking for in the pre purchase forum.... Here is my situation I have done vinyl work in the past for my high school many many years ago, but have done application work as recent as a few months ago as needed for  other projects.  I own a small construction company, we have added a few pieces of equipment and need to get them lettered. 2 large enclosed trailers, 2  large trucks, some jobsite signs,  other misc promo stuff...  Since we are doing several things at once the quotes I am getting have me floored.  And I was doing the application myself, so its not the install labor.  One of my friends also owns his own company and is wanting some similar projects done, he currently orders his stuff from the web.  So I am 99.9% sure I am going to get a cutter.  Here is my Question will this cutter work for my application, I dont care if it is loud, I wont be standing beside it every day.  I'm not going to make intricate stickers.  If I do  12" letters for my trailer sides will this cutter be adequate?  Then say I do a jobsite sign.... I'm not looking to run a full time sign shop off this cutter.  Tell me how you use your cutter in real world application, what kind of jobs do you do with the MH series?  I know a $2000 cutter is a better machine for a full time shop.  Am I looking at the wrong cutter for my application? 

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We use ours primarily for making decals and such for the products we make in the shop, although lately people have found out we have the cutter.  I did a $500 job today and met with a trucking company about doing all of their trucks...contract deal.  I probably do $200-$300 a week just from people who stop by wanting magnetic signs, corroplast, etc.

So to answer your question, yes, it will work just fine.

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Thanks, that's the direct kind of info I am looking for. Are you using the signblazer software? Anyone else?

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i have the 871 with a stand its a great cutter ihave ran a small sign shop with it for a year i have an old roland 960 also and i like the 871 better some of the straight lines are a little wavy [you have to look close to see it]ive never had anyone say anything about it tho, so i think were to picky for our own good, i use flexi 8.5 pro with both machines i have sign blazer and its ok also, im just use to flexi ,i bought the training dvd for it ,scut vinyl for 3 years to get my roland to work o it was easier to figure out,read the post by ccr or paco about how to set up the cutter they are really tricky for a nubi,hell they are tricky to set up for anyone it took me 3 weeks with the help mof a friend that had a cutter for 3 yearsto get my roland to cut turns out i had to have a null cable ,the 9 pin conector worked great with my 871[it came with the machine as did sign blazer]have fun this is a great forum

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I use my MH-871 daily.  Misc. projects.  I letter vehicles, make banners, stickers, cut heat press vinyl for T-shirts, etc.  I also cut mylar stencils for a local bakery.

Best advice I can offer, if you purchase this machine:  A) Buy 2.  They can be tempermental, and it's nice to grab the other one when you run into problems during a project.  An extra $300 is cheap insurance.  ;D Immediately ground the cutter to the stand, and the stand to something else when you get it.  Static can kill the motherboard on these inexpensive machines pretty easily.

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Seems the older model actually worked better.  Like preston said ground it many ways . . . .motherboard sales are brisk

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Thanks, that's the direct kind of info I am looking for. Are you using the signblazer software? Anyone else?

I use FlexiSign Pro 7.6.  I bought it way back when I was making much better money.  I could never justify it now.  Back then I had a full time sign shop and a part time machine shop and was using an MH721 cutter.  Now it's just opposite...I dabble in sign work but try to stay focused on the machine shop.  I have an 871 now.   I tried SignBlazer but it didn't light my fire.

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I just caught the " ground the cutter to a stand and the stand to something else" note. I did ground my cutter to the stand, but what is it that the stand should be grounded to? Thanks for the help. Sandy

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    SignBlazer Elements is the BEST  ;D . It was the best bang for the buck when it was selling for $99 . It has done everything I have wanted & I learn more things constantly . It is MUCH better than Flexi Starter IMO . Inkscape ( free ) is very good also , but doesn't cut so you have to wind up sending it to a cutting program .

  I would compare the CoPam 2500 . It gets high praise from the techs & is worth the difference IMO .

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Seems the older model actually worked better.  Like preston said ground it many ways . . . .motherboard sales are brisk

I have a newer model..less than a year old..and it works fine...no problems at all. Cuts as it should. I don't think it's a problem with all of them, just the odd bad machine. You seldom here about the ones that have no problems.

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Grounding the stand - I don't know about any other 871 users, but when I grounded my cutter to the stand, I started having some problems.  The display would go all goofy, but I could press reset and escape any problems.  So....Next I added a ground wire from the stand to the steel desk next to it.  Solved the problems.  The static seems to dissipate quicker when unrolling. 

I also removed the carpet mat that I had sitting under the cutter.  I think it was making things worse.

I addition, I touch a metal electrical box on the wall to ground myself before loading vinyl.  If there's a ton of static coming off the roll, I just touch the grounded electrical box with one hand, and touch the vinyl with the other until some of the static relieves.

If I continue to have problems, I might purchase (or make) an anti-static mat too. 

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Grounding the stand - I don't know about any other 871 users, but when I grounded my cutter to the stand, I started having some problems.  The display would go all goofy, but I could press reset and escape any problems.  So....Next I added a ground wire from the stand to the steel desk next to it.  Solved the problems.  The static seems to dissipate quicker when unrolling. 

I also removed the carpet mat that I had sitting under the cutter.  I think it was making things worse.

I addition, I touch a metal electrical box on the wall to ground myself before loading vinyl.  If there's a ton of static coming off the roll, I just touch the grounded electrical box with one hand, and touch the vinyl with the other until some of the static relieves.

If I continue to have problems, I might purchase (or make) an anti-static mat too. 

Preston why not just run a ground from the screw on the outlet to the stand and be done with it - the metal table isn't grounded but  a wire to the outlet will dissipate all static safely

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