First Cut

[Stephen H. 3]

Hi,

I got my cutter today the P28 and I followed the directions and setup the software which was a breeze, I was using Vinyl Master 4.2 Pro.

I put the machine on my work table to test it before assembling the stand. I followed advice I had heard about setting the Roland blade and just left a little out just enough to feel it.

My first test cut of the word Hi was great, it weeded perfect and didn't cut through at all. I was really worried as I have only ever used the Cameo Auto Blade.

I assembled the stand and as someone else pointed out the arms that hold the rollers there is a issue that prevents the roller from rolling freely. The metal was nice and not flimsy as I thought it might be since so many items no days are poorly manufactured. It was actually thicker than the metal shelves I bought last week.

Haven't had a chance to get to cut anything else but the first test was great.

[haumana 1,220]

Congrats on your new purchase. Sounds like you got up and running pretty fast.

I would be curious to see where and how the vinyl media rollers are binding.

[PM-Performance 21]

Congrats on your purchase. 

Yea you need to bend those roller ears a little so they roll properly. Other than that, the stand is pretty sturdy, but IMHO should have been a cheaper option for what it is. 

 

[Stephen H. 3]

On 9/26/2020 at 10:45 AM, PM-Performance said:

Congrats on your purchase. 

Yea you need to bend those roller ears a little so they roll properly. Other than that, the stand is pretty sturdy, but IMHO should have been a cheaper option for what it is. 

 

Can you give a video on instructing how to do that. I called support and they were not helpful. 

[PM-Performance 21]

On 10/4/2020 at 10:25 PM, Stephen H. said:

Can you give a video on instructing how to do that. I called support and they were not helpful. 

I believe I showed this already on one of my Prismcut videos. 

It is just using common mechanics really. put the rollers on and see which one is binding. 

If the outmost roller, put the roller in the next slots and just bend the ends in or out just a smidge and retry the roller until its right. You want the roller in the next slot to avoid bending the entire bracket and throwing the rear one out

If the innermost roller, take both out and bend the entire bracket in or out a smidge and retry until it rolls fine. 

 

I will agree that support is honestly completely useless. Once I finally got someone in support to call me, he seemed to know absolutely nothing and guessed all basic level things. If I had known the support was this poor from US Cutter, I would have bought elsewhere. Their lifetime support if bought from them appealed to me, but now I see how their support is, it is weak!

They can only use covid as a crutch for so much. 

Dont even get me started on Vinylmaster support. 

[Stephen H. 3]

On 10/9/2020 at 11:22 AM, PM-Performance said:

I believe I showed this already on one of my Prismcut videos. 

It is just using common mechanics really. put the rollers on and see which one is binding. 

If the outmost roller, put the roller in the next slots and just bend the ends in or out just a smidge and retry the roller until its right. You want the roller in the next slot to avoid bending the entire bracket and throwing the rear one out

If the innermost roller, take both out and bend the entire bracket in or out a smidge and retry until it rolls fine. 

 

I will agree that support is honestly completely useless. Once I finally got someone in support to call me, he seemed to know absolutely nothing and guessed all basic level things. If I had known the support was this poor from US Cutter, I would have bought elsewhere. Their lifetime support if bought from them appealed to me, but now I see how their support is, it is weak!

They can only use covid as a crutch for so much. 

Dont even get me started on Vinylmaster support. 

I told them if it wasn't for your videos I wouldn't have bought the cutter. Your videos were good and well put together. I went to their site to find out how to set the Prismcut to cut Oracal 651 and couldn't find any information at all. Asking around to others around that I know and online gave me responses over and over about just do test cuts, or never heard of that cutter so I don't know what to tell you. Nice cutter, but can't get help from anywhere when you need it. I tend to end up working with it outside of their normal hours of operation, so no help when you need it the most.

[MZ SKEETER 4,708]

There are no set in stone settings for any vinyl cutter, or vinyl. Even the same model can be different.  It is posted on this forum literally hundreds of times how to set your blade depth. Blade depth is set for the different vinyls that you use. Blade depth instructions are in Instructional Contributions, on this forum. If you would have written blade depth in the upper right search bar, it would have taken you to many, many posts to set the blade depth correctly  Blade depth is set the same way for any brand of vinyl cutter. 

To start with, you should set your blade depth correctly, by taking the blade holder out of the machine, and firmly cut across a piece of scrap vinyl, you will be cutting. You should only be cutting the vinyl and barely a mark on wax paper backing, Adjust blade to get there, Then put the blade holder back in machine, and use the force of the machine to get there, same results, only cutting the vinyl and barely a mark in wax paper backing. You should barely see and feel the blade out of the blade holder

[Wildgoose 4,200]

I'm with Skeeter. A cutter is a cutter and the same very basic setup is necessary as a user no matter the cutter from top of the line down to the bottom rung. I realize that they don't also sell you the knowledge to use them, you have to figure that part out. A cutter is a specialized tool. The use of a cutter is more a craft or a trade than something like using a printer or a laminator. I am self taught as most on this forum. There may be a class you can pay for somewhere (although I have not seen one) but most of us on the forum here figured it out on our own. To be honest, it's not rocket science and while a little confusing at first if you have some patience you can do it. 

Set the Blade depth (also sometimes called blade exposed) This is not to be confused with cutting depth, this is just how far the blade sticks out of the blade holder.

Set the speed parameter which I personally recommend being set at 1/4 of the max speed for your cutter. You can speed up or down from there. Videos of other cutters help with what speed you should run. I am not a fan of running too fast but some people run flat out max. 

Set the down-force or blade cutting pressure. THIS is what actually determines how deep you cut into the vinyl. It is best to start low and work up so that you don't cut all the way through your vinyl and carrier and brake a tip on your blade (and damage the cutting strip)

Set your blade offset. (should have been set roughly based on the recommendation that came with the cutter. These vary a bit but I think a standard blade will be around 0.35 to 0.45 mm but each cutter is different. My current high end cutter has my normal blade at about 0.35 and my heavy duty 60deg blade at 0.90mm so there can be a lot of difference. This value is basically the distance from the true center of your blade to the blade tip that is ground a ways off from center so that it will work like the castor wheel on a shopping cart as the cutter drags it around the cut job. It has to compensate for the distance as it goes around corners to keep the cut in the right place. 

Possibly set Overcut. This is a little bit of distance that the blade travels after the end of a given object is cut so that the stopping point connects with the starting point. Most cutters do NOT need offset but it is usually an option to allow users to tweak things if they are finding that their cuts do not complete. It is usually no more than the same number that the offset was. 

That is about all there is to any cutter setup. Doing this one step at a time and making sure it is as spot on as possible makes ALL the difference in the quality of the cut. Little things like ignoring the significance of the very first one (Blade Depth) have surprisingly big consequences. I am attaching a couple pics of helps that may benefit you and future searchers.