MrsYee

NEW to PrismCut! Don't know which question to ask first!

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New to PrismCut.  Upgraded from a Cricut Explore Air 2. Among my various jobs, I do a lot of shirts and decals for a local scout troop.  Their logo has an eagle with some smaller details.  See uploaded images and know it's cut at roughly 3"x3" on HTV and 5"x5" on exterior vinyl. The Greenstar exterior vinyl I have for decals will not weed without everything pulling off the backing. I thought the problem was my Cricut, so bought the PrismCut.   First attempts to cut and weed the eagle have not been successful.  Everything is pulling off the backing whether HTV or exterior vinyl.  I've done another job with larger letters and very little detail, using the Greenstar exterior vinyl, without issue.  This is also my first time using Greenstar.  Is it the vinyl?  Is it the cutter?

I've set the blade depth as Mz Skeeter instructed, not using the 1/2 credit card, but setting the blade to barely cut the vinyl layer then inserting in cutter.  It cuts perfectly fine on large, basic cuts.  Anything detailed or just smaller fonts will not weed without pulling everything off the backing.  Here's some of the questions I have and I really appreciate any feedback you can give!

1. Do you use a mat with HTV? 

2. What speed/force should be used when using HTV?  ...when using exterior vinyl?  

3. Does the pressure change whether using a mat vs not?

4. If someone has experience using both VinylMaster LTR and Sure Cuts a Lot, can you tell me which software you prefer and why?

I'm really trying not to get discouraged with my purchase.  There are so many things I love about the PrismCut, not the least of which is the ability to cut larger designs and to be able to utilize every bit of vinyl width without a margin.  I am really struggling with how to accomplish the smaller letters and details that I was able to do with my Cricut where weeding isn't so frustrating!  I've destroyed a lot of vinyl in the last couple of days.  

I appreciate any help I can get!

 

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Shirt front.PNG

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The Green Star vinyl is your problem. It's just not good. Go with Siser Vinyl and you'll be amazed at the difference.

As for HTV vs "normal" vinyl, I don't change any of the settings on my machine. Actually, HTV is much more forgiving and you can get some very intricate designs to cut. The downside is, too small of pieces don't have enough adhesive to stick to the shirt. So while you may be able to cut it, it might not stick to the shirt.

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I am late to the discussion but thought I would add my bit. I am not totally familiar with the PrismCut but according to the user manual, any material that has a carrier (backing) can (and I add for emphasis) probably SHOULD be loaded right in the cutter without using the mat.

I am one who often pooh-hoo's the greenstar exterior vinyl along with the others but honestly have no problems with cutting and weeding it most of the time. My problem with it is longevity, but for very temporary use it's fine and for very abrasive situations it can also outperform higher end vinyl simply because it's so much thicker. For instance I prefer it for sand blast resist on glass because the adhesive lets go easier for removal after the blasting process. If you are having major weeding issues it is more likely that you're a bit out of "tune" with your machine settings. 

If you are having trouble with weeding HTV of almost any brand then you definitely have some dialing in to do because HTV is very easy if it has adhesive backing. Some of the styles that are not adhesive attached to the carrier will weed more poorly though. (Siser Easyweed got it's name for a reason). 

I suggest double checking your various settings. 

1. Blade depth (more accurately described as blade exposed). You said you followed Skeeters method and so you should be fine if you did that. Be sure that your blade holder still clears the top of the vinyl just barely. Sometimes if you are actually dragging across the top it will prevent cutting all the way through. I like to watch the cut in action and make sure I can see just a little bit of light between the blade holder and the vinyl while it's working. You should be able to see a slight scratch in the carrier sheet but not feel the impression/dent from the cut on the back side of the carrier sheet. (THIS SHOULD BE DONE ON REGULAR SIGN VINYL not on HTV) I recommend doing the hand cut set-up on greenstar with is 3mil thick and then you will be good for all 3mil and 2 mil products which is most of what you will be doing. You don't need to re-adjust between 3 and 2 mil. ALSO be sure you haven't accidentally broken a tip off prior to doing this step or it's all for nothing. Tips can break if you accidentally had too much out the first time and cut through and snagged your cutting strip while doing maneuvers. If you have a high level magnifier you can sometimes spot a broken tip but most of the cheap blades that come with the Chinese machines just aren't that expensive so maybe set it aside and start with a brand new one until you get dialed in and KNOW FOR SURE how it's supposed to be able to cut.  - A word about HTV vs regular sign vinyl. For intricacy HTV is more forgiving and you can also get away with more down force (cutting force applied to the blade) without it cutting though your carrier because the HTV carriers are usually plastic and are tough. HOWEVER HTV can be less forgiving if you have a dull blade or a broken tip where regular sign vinyl will let you still get the job done with a dull/worn tip. Yes they do wear a bit over time. I have had several time that I was fine when cutting regular vinyl but had major problems getting HTV to cut and it took me a painful minute to figure out my tip was rounded down. 

2. After you are 100% on the blade you will want to run a test cut at a pressure that should be less than you need to cut through your sign vinyl. Too much and you may break your new blade tip right off the bat. Work into the cutting force a little at a time until you reach the point where you cut though and just scratch the backing. IF you machine has a hand built in test feature that is best but you can also just create a small square or rectangle. My machine has a test square with an X in the middle and when cut you can pluck it off the backing and also see that the X has been cut through as well. It is about a half inch or maybe slightly larger. does not waste a bunch of product to test. 

3. Once you get your pressure set then you will want to check to see if your blade offset is dialed in. The idea behind this is that the point on the blade is like a castor wheel on a shopping cart and as the machine lowers it into the vinyl it may be rotated in an odd angle and then as the blade begins to cut the "castor" drags the point of the tip into the following position as the cutting head moves about the design.  Once again a square works well but maybe a bit bigger like 3/4". You will want to cut the square and play with the offset so that you can see the corners of the square go from round to perfect and then to having little "tails" and figure out where the middle of those was. The number that was the squarest corner is where you want to be and you should write that down because it will be your number for the foreseeable future. My cutter says that as blade ware happens this needs to be adjusted slightly but I just run a blade about half a year and throw it away. (This was good advice I got from Dakotagrafx years ago and have never needed to look back)

4. There may be a setting called "Overcut". The above mentioned castor concept is also pertaining to this setting.  When the blade reaches the end of the cut it raises back up and sometimes there is a very small piece of uncut vinyl at that point where the end meets the beginning. Overcut is to allow a little extra run-out to make sure that the two points meet. In theory is should only be a bit longer than the amount of castor built into your blade tip. Maybe slightly more than half of your blade offset and no more than the total thickness of your blade. Most cutter do not need ANY overcut, I recommend reading your manual about this IF it even offers the option. 

I also do not know enough about the prism to know if these settings are done directly on the machine or only within the cutting software. You will have to figure that out on your end or another user may chime in. This has been a long drawn out answer but hopefully it help you or a future search gain some cutter knowledge. There are all these settings and sometime they make no sense at first. Good luck!

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Thanks, everyone, for your feedback!! It's certainly a lot more detailed than I could have hoped for.  I'm struggling right now with cutting text on the Sizer Easyweed Stretch HTV.  It absolutely will not weed.  I'm going to go thru the suggestions above. 

Part of my problem is a complete lack of experience with the PrismCut to the point that I have no references as to what changes constitute a noticeable increase or a decrease.  The settings used in videos by PMPerformance on YouTube show a speed of 400 and a pressure of 70.  If I start there and the results aren't what I'm looking for, how much change should I start with?  Do I change both speed and pressure at the same time?  

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I don't own a Prismcut.  But you set the blade depth the correct way on every vinyl cutter.  It starts with the correct blade depth, which has been posted here hundreds of times.  Do not use a credit card or post it notes. They are incorrect.  There are not any set in stone settings for vinyl cutters. You set your blade depth to the vinyl being used to cut. I don't use HTV, but make sure you are cutting on the correct side. Put speed slow, until you learn the machine.  No need to cut fast.  You just mess up faster. Small text you should cut slow.

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 tip out of the blade holder. Regular sign vinyl is only 2-3 mil thick. You only cut with the very tip of the blade. When you think the blade is so far in the blade holder, that you think it would not even cut, that is probably correct. 

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I've followed your instructions on setting the blade depth.  I probably read most of the hundreds of posts you've made about it :)  Where does the offset come in?  I'm cutting slow with high pressure.  Most of the word cuts ok, then the last letter won't cut straight through, so it pulls up when weeding.

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52 minutes ago, MrsYee said:

I've followed your instructions on setting the blade depth.  I probably read most of the hundreds of posts you've made about it :)  Where does the offset come in?  I'm cutting slow with high pressure.  Most of the word cuts ok, then the last letter won't cut straight through, so it pulls up when weeding.

The Chart is above for blade offset.  Make a test cut or a square from your cutter. What does it look like compared to the chart above?  add a little overcut in your cutting software.  Blade offset you usually start at 0.25mm  then adjust + or minus  depending on what is needed.

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42 minutes ago, MZ SKEETER said:

The Chart is above for blade offset.  Make a test cut or a square from your cutter. What does it look like compared to the chart above?  add a little overcut in your cutting software.

What has the ultimate control over speed and force, the cutter or the software?  I notice they don't match...

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I don't use a Prismcut.  It would depend on what your user manual says. Your cutter is a rebranded Skycut,  maybe find a user manual for that.

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For beginners I usually recommend doing about 1/4 to 1/3 speed. So if your cutter goes to 600 I'd shoot for 150 to 200 to get started. You don't want to be too slow but you don't need to be slamming things around. Once you get it dialed in (And you will! Don't give up!) then you can speed up to whatever turns your crank. I don't run my $3500 cutter any faster than about 200mm/sec most of the time. If your car engine redlines at 5000 rpm it's generally not all that smart to rev it there all the time, at least that's my opinion. Each to his own though. 

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10 hours ago, MrsYee said:

What has the ultimate control over speed and force, the cutter or the software?  I notice they don't match...

If you are seeing a difference between the two it is entirely possible that your changes are not being applied to the cutter. You'll want to figure out what's going on there. My software (different than yours) has a check box to either allow or not allow the program to control the cutter settings. I personally do the cutter setting directly on the cutter. Some budget cutters do not have the ability to adjust any of the setting manually on the cutter. I never trusted the software to be completely trustworthy and it seemed prudent to make sure my cutter was doing what I told it without the possibility of some weird thing happening. I'm less trusting than some so your mileage may vary. 

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And some budget cutters, namely the MH, you can only adjust the speed and force on the cutter.

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12 hours ago, Wildgoose said:

For beginners I usually recommend doing about 1/4 to 1/3 speed. So if your cutter goes to 600 I'd shoot for 150 to 200 to get started. You don't want to be too slow but you don't need to be slamming things around. Once you get it dialed in (And you will! Don't give up!) then you can speed up to whatever turns your crank. I don't run my $3500 cutter any faster than about 200mm/sec most of the time. If your car engine redlines at 5000 rpm it's generally not all that smart to rev it there all the time, at least that's my opinion. Each to his own though. 

Great point!!  My only experience has been with a Cricut.  I let it do everything, never took any initiative to try to override anything it did.  I see that my cutter goes to 800 so I've set it at 245.  My blades say 0.3mm offset, so I assume that's where I start and adjust from there, if needed? 

I'm about to run another cut job and see how these adjustments work.  I can tell it's improving but there are still one or two places where the cut is missed.  Fingers crossed :) 

I cannot tell you how much I appreciate your encouragement.  I've been really wondering if I've made a huge mistake with my investment. I haven't actually called USCutter for support.  Is that something I should consider?

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2 hours ago, darcshadow said:

And some budget cutters, namely the MH, you can only adjust the speed and force on the cutter.

Thanks!  I will just try to make it a point to make them match.  I just happened to notice that they are backwards and that might have contributed to my issues so far.  My cutter has "Speed" then "Force".  I obviously didn't pay close enough attention to the software because it has "Force" then "Speed".  It's fixed now.  Sigh...  
 

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7 hours ago, MrsYee said:

I cannot tell you how much I appreciate your encouragement.  I've been really wondering if I've made a huge mistake with my investment. I haven't actually called USCutter for support.  Is that something I should consider?

Most of us were in your shoes at some point and understand the frustration when it seems like inanimate objects have conspired against you. At some point you will look back and wonder why it seemed so hard to get to work right. My niece has a cricuit and there are some things that it does better than what we here on the forum consider a "real cutter". Such as craft paper on the little cutting board they have. But once you're used to the real thing you won't go back. I have turned my activities into a part time business and so at the moment I use mine to make money, but I can tell you I doubt I will EVER have a future that does NOT have a cutter tucked over in a corner somewhere. Their just too much fun and too handy for all sorts of nik-naks that I don't see myself without one ever again. 

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