Great Cut Expert 24 Help

[beachnsled 2]

Hello

Very very new to the world of Vinyl Cutting. We just bought a GC Expert 24 (will be upgrading eventually - no doubt!) - its about a month old. When we first starting using our cutter we had minimal issues. Slowly we are getting very very jagged/curvy edges on what should be clean cuts (our most recent was a sign created in Corel - direct export to the cutter). We also had some graphics hand vectored for us by Vector Magic - which also cut beautifully at first - but are now all a jagged mess (we were told that there is some sort of a compatibilty issue with AI & the software we have for the cutter). We have reached out to the GCC customer service (by phone & email) and we cannot get any real help (not to mention that the user manual is really no help). Any advice that we can get would be very very appreciated.

[mb20music 760]

Can you post pictures of what the cuts look like?

[Jay2703 704]

Check that the carriage hasn't come loose. Also check that the blade spins freely in the holder.

[beachnsled 2]

Hello again... thanks for the replies so far. Here is an image of the most recent cut - created in CorelDrawX5 & exported to the cutter - it appears to be very very wobbly, not just jagged. Re: the carriage, I will check that, however I hate to say this, we just don't know how to tell. The "trouble shooting" section of our user manual is pretty much zero help - doesn't explain much of anything. I should note that we did change the blade for fear that it could have been dulling & we checked to see if it was loose (again, not even sure how to tell, other than visually noticing wobbling)

Thanks again.. I will check back.

[Jay2703 704]

With the cutter off, just grab it and gently try to move it around. It should roll freely back and forth along the rail but should feel like it jiggles around.

[mb20music 760]

Looks to me like the blade holder or carriage is loose.

[beachnsled 2]

Thanks.... I will start there.

[mb20music 760]

With the cutter off, just grab it and gently try to move it around. It should roll freely back and forth along the rail but should feel like it jiggles around.

I think he means it SHOULDN'T feel like it jiggles around. There shouldn't be any free play when you try to move the blade holder.

[beachnsled 2]

I did forget to mention that we had the vinyl wrinkle up on us a few times binding up the cutter and stopping the machine when we were cutting a long run. I am assuming that this could do damage to the holder and or the carriage. I checked the carriage and it seems to be tight, although when I slide it down the track I can feel what seems to be a little bit of resistance roughly every five inches not perfectly smooth. The belt seems to be tight. As for the blade holder the blade does have some movement a the tip. Is there any tolerance for blade movement at the tip? When applying pressure to the blade extractor the blade does get hung up and not pop out. The blade does spin freely though.

[beachnsled 2]

Thanks to everyone!

[Jay2703 704]

Did you get it figured out?

[beachnsled 2]

Thanks to all who helped us back in April! We were able to figure everything out & the cutter has been working PERFECT up until about 4 days ago. We seem to have run into a similar issue, the cuts are jagged (although, less of a "loose" jagged & more of a "straight" jagged appearance - if that makes any sense). Also, the machine is making a very strange noise. We took apart the blade & housing to ensure that it was clean & free of any loose vinyl, dust etc. Not sure what the issue is, as it has been working great. Any ideas? Below is a sample of what its now doing...

[beachnsled 2]

Anyone... Bueller, Bueller,

Thanks in advance!