MSellers15

Contour Cutting Small Decals

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I've always had trouble contour cutting small decals (These are 3 inch in width) ever since I got my Graphtec FC8000. I rarely ever have problems cutting out big jobs/logos but I have always tried to stay away from doing small jobs because of the cuts never being accurate. I've ran my cutting speed on pretty much the lowest (5) and doesn't seem to help either. What do y'all recommend me trying?

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What does that mean does not cut accurate.?  Start with the basics.  Too many people don't have the blade depth set correctly. That is where you must start. Blade offset is zero.   I have purchased 4 different Graphtecs and they all cut perfect and very small text.   2 are Graphtec FC units. 

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. Regular sign vinyl is only 2-3 mil thick. You only cut with the very tip of the blade. 

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Okay. Yeah I feel like it's setup correctly. I usually cut bigger stickers everyday and they cut just fine. I've adjusted the blade depth, offset is 0, and adjusted the sensor offset with the crosshair pattern. I just always had problems cutting little stickers out. The cut lines seems to always be off like in the second photo above.

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Been messing with it for the last 3 hours and pretty much went over the basics again and something worked. No idea what it was and don't care. As long as it works haha!!

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Just a question, do you print and cut these as one large print job and registration marks out on the edges or a series of copies? I don't print so do not contour cut but have read in my users manual about the various options on my cutter (Summa not Graphtec) and it appears that it will do it either way. Just logical thinking there may be a discrepancy if doing multiple copies where it is getting off somewhere along the process of doing multiple copies. If it's all one graphic then either it isn't (or didn't) read the marks well or it's fighting off tracking which would show problems on the later part of the project. Summa has additional registration marks every so often down the sides to keep track of any variance, I would assume Graphtec will do similar. 

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This was a small job that was around 12 inches so I only used 1 set of registration marks on each corner. On bigger jobs i use a lot more down the side of the graphic so it doesn't skew to one way while it is cutting. I was thinking my problem was too much force and it was creating a drag. 

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