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rcerra

PCUT HORROR!!!!

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had cutter 3 mos now, trackibng off from day one! installed 2 additional pinch rollers, tracks off 3/4 " in 10 feet. My master cutter has never done this! How about a refund on this little used machine? Rick

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Something must not be right with the blade depth or the pinch rollers, or maybe event he feed rollers. If you have only had it for 30 days or less, you are still within the return period for a refund. If you are beyond, then we would be happy to exchange the unit for you.

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Guest gracewriter

I'd take the exchange.  I had the exact same problem with my pcut.  Traded it for a refine.  I guess some of the pcuts have this problem.  Seriously, TAKE THE EXCHANGE.  You'll be a lot happier as the refine has adjustable pinch rollers.

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I HAVE HAD THIS FOR OVER 2 MONTHS, I HAVE 4 PINCH ROLLERS, THAT IS WITH THE EXTRA ONE'S I ORDERED TO TRY AND SOLVE THE PROBLEM. I DON'T HAVE THE ORGINAL BOX. THE CUTTING DEPTH IS FINE, CUTS PROPERLY AND NO CUT THROUGH EVER! I AM JUST DISCUSDED AT HIS POINT. I CAN'T EVEN SPELL TONIGHT. ;D IF I HAVE TO PAY FOR ALL THE FREIGHT TO RETURN, PLUS DRIVE THE 40 MILES TO UPS, IS IT WORTH IT.  RICK

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Wow, four pinch rollers and still a problem. Did you try and cut something narrower? Say 10" wide or less on both drive rollers? If your looking for no drift after 10', get a tractor feed plotter. Even the high end plotters drift. It's a vinyl alignment problem when setting up. Not a plotter problem. Mine tracks fine after I indexed it and added my alignment marks. Took about 20 minutes.

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i guess i am just use to my other cutter(master) adjustable pinch rollers. i do 24' garbage dumpsters, @ 16" high letters. each line is 11 to 12 feet long. adjustable rollers on other machine, indexed the vinyl and i get maybe 1/8" in 12 feet. i am cleaning all rollers at this time, i am at a wits end with this one. i am sure the problem will get resolved. just upset because of loss of so much material. without moving vinyl from machine, some days its tracks better than others, have used differient vinyls. how does everyone set down the pinch rollers? easy or snap them down? i have tried both to no avail. TY to al Rick

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when you say that some days it tracks better than others, I am thinking that the machine isn't changing...it's more how the vinyl is loaded. With the pCut, having it perfectly straight makes all the difference. My brother has one, and he measures from the edge of the machine to edge of the vinyl,front and back, until it is exact down to the micron.

On my Seiki, I consider myself lucky if I get as little as 1/8 inch drift. But it doesn't seem to matter on text...it might be uneven on the roll but it is still straight when I weed it. And that's what counts.

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Guest gracewriter

Brother, I know exactly how you feel.

I had THE EXACT same problem.  I did EVERYTHING YOU DID and went through EVERYTHING you are going through.  It is not the vinyl I also had ten different kinds of vinyl. NONE OF THEM TRACKED.  It's not the pressure, it's not anything other than the pinch rollers are not nor ever will be tight enough.  What was really weird was every once in a while it would actually track, but never EVER did it more than once in about 20 to 50 runs.

I also went through about two months of trying to get it to track.  It cannot nor ever will track properly as you don't have adjustable pinch rollers.

This is a problem with the machine.  There is nothing you can do to fix it.  Send it back and trade it.  When I got my refine and ran the first piece through and it came out PERFECT on the tracking, I knew instantly it was not me, it was the problem with the rollers on the pcut.  I wasted about $200.00 worth of vinyl on that pcut!!!!

Do yourself a favor, pack it up and send it back for an exchange.  After the pcut, you'll LOVE the refine.  It is such a relief after that nightmare experience to know I have a machine I can count on now to give me decent tracking.  I also like the ruler better on the refine it's easier to see and use.  Only draw back is I have to reset the pressure and speed each time I power it up.  After what I went through, I'd gladly go through these two minor extra steps for the peace of mind.  The COM port also works better on this machine than the usb, at least on mine.

There is a thread on here somewhere that I started like this one a few months ago.  It got over 100 responses from people trying to help me get it to track.

Again, do yourself a favor and trade it, NOW.  Don't waste another minute driving yourself nuts over this thing.

Just 50 cents worth.

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probably the right thing to do, i am not a pro but make alot of money trying :D even if i do not remove vinyl or lift the pinch rollers from machine, one cut it works fine, next one off track a ton. i am lucky that i only use white vinyl for this one company, so i leave it on machine at all times. i have a stika that i use for small jobs and a master cutter i use for t-shirts and smaller window signs. i bought the uscutter for just use with client. I cut 2 16" x11"  and charge them $150.00 installed. they have over 350 dumpsters and they recondition them every 4-6 months. do you see why i need this to work eeverytime all of the time. i guess i can afford to buy a better cutter :)  thanks for all the input, where do i send it to and what am i going to get in return? Rick

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tha t is supposed to be 11 feet, not inches, hum, sounds better for me the other way! Rick :)

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Guest gracewriter

Ken already contacted you on this thread and offered a trade.  You can call him or pm him.  He's probably off today.  I'm sure he'll show up the minute he gets back on and help you make the arrangements.

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I guess I'm experiencing the same thing others are.  So far anything under 24" hasn't been a problem for me but I have a job thats 9' long and over that distance the tracking is off about an inch.  I've done everything I can do to try to align the vinyl as straight as possible.  I could run the vinyl through and it would look like it stayed pretty close.  But when I would reverse it back out, it would just veer off to the side.

So far the only option I can come up with is to waste 10' of 24" vinyl when 10' of 15" should work.....

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I guess I'm experiencing the same thing others are.  So far anything under 24" hasn't been a problem for me but I have a job thats 9' long and over that distance the tracking is off about an inch.  I've done everything I can do to try to align the vinyl as straight as possible.  I could run the vinyl through and it would look like it stayed pretty close.  But when I would reverse it back out, it would just veer off to the side.

So far the only option I can come up with is to waste 10' of 24" vinyl when 10' of 15" should work.....

1" over 108" is 1/2 of a degree in angle. I would be happy with that out of a $300 machine.

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I could live with that too..... IF.... as the vinyl moves back and forth through the machine, the cuts would stay accurate and not get distorted as the tracking goes whichever way it wants to go over that distance....

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Do you have it set so it minimized the vinyl movement? This way it will cut one letter at a time along the length of the vinyl instead of doing all of the cutouts first then coming back and finishing the outside of the letters.

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All "the veterans' at this game seem to have an answer; how about the machine just sucks-no wonder it's the cheapest on the market. One doesn't even get software with it!

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That is another option.  But it's like buying a Kia and complaining it doesn't perform like a Ferrari.

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I'm fully aware that its a $300 machine and I am fully aware that I attempted to do something that was outside of its boundaries.  I just will not try anything that large with it again. 

And it wasnt individual letters.  It was a long tribal flame design that was going to go on the side of a car.  So it was long sweeping lines.

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All "the veterans' at this game seem to have an answer; how about the machine just sucks-no wonder it's the cheapest on the market. One doesn't even get software with it!

The machine is great for the price point, and performs just as well as the name brand units if you know what you are doing. It DOES come with software, so not sure what you are implying there....

If a customer is having a problem with the tracking, it could be a number of things.

1) Not ALL vinyl is perfectly straight to begin with.

2) You need to manually feed enough material through the machine a few times back and forth to check for drift before you cut.

3) Make sure the pinch rollers are locked down over the feed rollers, or it will cause unwanted drift.

4)

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Overall I am happy with the PCut.  It does exactly what I bought it for and so far has done it well.  When I bought it, I had no intention of trying to do something 9' long for the side of a car but I was asked to try it by a friend so I did.  I now know from experience that this is not something I can do with it so I will not try it again.  I will keep my efforts to the much smaller things that I intended to use it for.

I did not buy it looking to start a business.  I especially did not buy looking to make money.  My experiences using it for everything but the 9' long graphic has been good.  Again, I'm pretty much happy with it.

I got software with mine so I'm not what thats all about.

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