bossman696

This is true. But just to be safe, it may be time to renew that old Lynda.com subscription for a refresher!

Are you tracing the design with a program like illustrator? I had problems like that when I was tracing items and didn't hit the IGNORE WHITE check box in the trace dialog. Basically a black and white design produces two cut likes on top of each other if you leave the check box unchecked. Hence the double cutting issue I was having. This may have nothing to do with what your issue may be.

I learned something new. I only used Illustrator for tracing images. I have designed in Indesign for years and feel much more comfortable there. I export as a High res .jpeg and then open in Illustrator to trace and send to sign cut. I really need to expand a bit and try new things.

I want to produce a better product personally. I think my issues come from expecting perfection. I have been a commercial printer for 24 years and we routinely look for dot to dot registration. I have totally control over the look and feel of my product and that is not always the case with cutting vinyl or heat pressing t-shirts. I used to get heat transfers in from certain companies and the colors didn't line up, or they weren't consistent. After trying several companies, with the same issues, I just assumed that was the nature of the game. FMExpressions changed my mind on that, but that story is for a different post. I am a stickler for quality, but I'm also a cheap skate, which causes problems on many fronts. I price my items based on what I would pay and that gets me into trouble sometimes. Especially when I want what I produce to be the best it could be! So I put in more time than I should on projects to make them look great. That is probably why I'm so busy. I have learned slowly that you have to get paid what you are worth. If that means losing a job here or there, so be it. That was probably a customer that would never be loyal as they would always be looking for the best deal.

I have an open house to go to held by our paper Supplier on Wednesday. Graphtec will be represented, maybe I can get a one on one demo and a good deal. I will be taking a few cut files and vinyl samples to see what they can do with them. It's not that type of demonstration, but if they want to make a sale, it will turn into one… LOL

I will have to try that and see if it helps my issue. Mine seems to be like the previous poster's where it is not alway present or noticeable. The new cutter was more of a way to increase my quality and a result of that "I see, I want" mentality that I am sure has gotten a few of us in trouble. I need a new cutting strip on my SC and maybe with the belt adjustment we can by pass the new toy for a while. Thank you.

Just reread this topic and realized I never responded back. I purchased the 4th roller and it has made a huge difference in my t-shirt vinyl cutting. It helps with the bunching problem I was having and I don't have as many issues with weeding because the start and finish of the cut didn't exactly line up. Overall I am very pleased with the addition of a 4th pinch roller.

Does anyone know where I can get an additional Pinch roller for a SC Series Cutter? I don't see anything listed in the parts section. Does anyone know if the MH Pinch roller will fit an SC Series. I use my cutter mostly for t-shirt vinyl which is not as stiff and traditional vinyl and I feel an extra pinch roller would cut down of some of the bunching I get when cutter the thinner stuff. Any help would be greatly appreciated!

The section 179 deduction is what I have normally done over the years. I have always normally just charged it and paid it off. I'm afraid I won't be as lucky with this purchase as I was when I first started. I ordered a heat press, 24 SC cutter and a few supplies and paid for everything with my first four orders. I think I may sell my Nikon D7000 and accessories and get the cash to buy the graphtec. Leases just seem like to much of an expense. Thanks for the links Slice. Some one mentioned you may have been the person with issues with your SC cutter cutting wavy diagonal lines and a possible fix? Is that correct?

My day job wouldn't send me to Print 13 or SGIA. I guess they would rather pay for me to travel to each individual vendor for the equipment demos rather then pay for one trip and see them all in one place How am I expected to open a satellite printshop from scratch if I can't go see the equipment?

I have a couple of more of the same type signs to do this weekend and I will be sure to take pictures of the process and final product. I will post shortly.

Has anyone else tried this. I applied a green vinyl background to 50 - 15 x 22" foam boards and then added yellow letters to the green back ground using this cold laminator. I wish I had taken a picture of the final project, my wife gets on to me all the time about not taking pictures of my work. It was so much easier than trying to do it by hand and there was not a bubble to be found!

I have had my SC cutter for over a year and have had very good luck with it. I have only recently started wanting something better. I recently did 50 - 15"x 22" signs for the local middle school with it and it ran great. I started having issues with corners lifting on the letters and some inconsistent cut depths. I started thinking since I was so busy and finally making some money, why not step up to the Graphtecs I have been hearing so much about. But now I'm hesitant and think my cutting issues may have just been the backing stripping need to be changed. It has grooves from one end to the other. Xpaperman, do you have issues with wavy lines when cutting diagonal lines on your SC? Like when I cut a diamond shape or large W's I can see a slight waviness in the slanted lines.

I thought it was just me.

I use Macs exclusively and have also been looking at the VE Qe-6000 and the Graphtec CE6000. Based on this thread I guess I'll spend the extra and go with the Graphtec for ease of use and conversion. I was wondering about the plug-ins though? Do they allow you to use the ARMS system or is that exclusive to the Graphtec Studio program? What about cutting multiple copies of the same design? Do you have to manually step them in Illustrator when using the plug-in or does it take you to a program that does it for you. I currently use SignCutPro and it handles stepping and weed lines etc and the plug-in basically just sends that info from Illustrator to the program and it takes over from there.

That's interesting. I'm using a Mac and that solved my USB problems.

This may be a little late but I traced my USB problems to the USB hub. Hubs have a tendency to cycle and that seems to cause bad cuts do to lost information. I have an Us Cutter SC cutter and an Epson T3000 and both were stopping in the middle of longer jobs. I got a key span for the SC and switched to an Ethernet connection for the T3000 but was curious as to why the USB caused so many issues. When testing later, I plugged the USB directly into my computer and not a hub and even though testing was limited, I didn't have any issues.

I did the same thing and I have only had one software related failed cut since. The keyspan adaptor is well worth the money. It has solved virtually all of the problems I was having using a USB connection.

Thank You... I do appreciate that! Off to the parts section....

I'm currently using three pinch rollers and cut 20 inch rolls mostly. It feeds and tracks just fine, but it looks like it tries to bunch up when cutting between the pinch rollers at distance.. I will definitely try pre-feeding my rolls in the future as I remember it snatching a couple of times in the past. I stretched a light weight bungie cord across my roller bearings so the rolls wouldn't just dump feed onto the floor. Took a few times of that happening to learn that lesson.

I recently started using a keyspan adaptor. It was the best money I have spent in this business. No more stopping issues or incomplete cuts. I will say however it was a pain to get the CORRECT drivers installed as the ones that came with it were outdated. It is pretty much a necessity to go to each manufacturers website and download the latest drivers for your model. I am using an 2010 iMac with OSX 10.7.5.

I am really GLAD to see that USCutter is addressing the concerns of its customers with the new youtube videos they have been releasing. These are all issues I had in the past and had to go to other sources to find answers to my problems. Especially the static issues and the problems people were having with setting up the stands out of the box. I especially like the breakdown of the lower cost cutters. I went with the SC model months ago and had issues right out of the box. The side travel limit switch was bent and it tried to driver the carriage out the side of the machine when you first turned it on. Luckily I was familiar with machines like this and figured it out pretty quickly. Other than stopping quite often in the middle of cuts, I have been pretty happy with my purchase. I think my stopping issues is due to my USB connection and have since ordered the keyspan adaptor. We will see how it goes when it comes in.

Ever since installing the keyspan adaptor, this is been nothing less than a pleasure to use! Great machine!

Is anyone else having trouble with SIgnCut Productivity Pro when they try and contour cut? It crashes every time I go through the process of marking the three registration points. I can cut regular vector files with no problems, but every time I go through the contour cutting options, the program crashes. I am using an SC 25 from US Cutter on a iMac running Lion. I have the direct USB connection. Side note: I am able to calibrate without issue using the arrow keys on screen and the keyboard, so I don't think it's a communication problem. I spoke with a tech at Sign Cut Pro and they said the Laser Option was not supported for the SC Cutters in the current version but would be in the new release.... But I have seen too many videos showing it working so I wanted to make sure there wasn't some other issue. I was wondering if anyone is able to do it using maybe an older version of the OSX (Pre-Lion)? I am using the 1.95 BETA build which is what was included with the cutter....

Were you able to get your .ps files to open in Signcut yet? It may be some of the export setting you have set that are causing an issue.