Paper/vinyl cutter bots?
GordonMcComb
Posts: 3,366
Anyone have a Craft Robo or similar cutting machine? Has anyone had much success making one by converting an old dot matrix or ink jet printer?
-- Gordon
-- Gordon
Comments
That is unlikely to be very successful. The reason is that the paper advance mechanism in a printer does not need to accommodate bi-directional motion and can get by with rubber pinch rollers. Plotters and vinyl cutters used grit wheels that make an indelible impression in the medium. This keeps the medium locked to the feed mechanism without slippage, regardless of how many back-and-forth iterations it makes. Rubber pinch rollers will creep after many direction changes.
-Phil
But on the larger issue of cutters, I'm wondering with all the 3D printing craze if we're not overlooking the forest for the trees. I've some examples of 3D papercraft models made on an ink jet or color laser (with registration marks) then cut out on one of these cutting machines. For classroom settings especially, this offers a great deal of hands-on mechanical experience for what ends up costing pennies per student. 3D printing is slow and costly, and CNC routers are expensive and dangerous in school settings. I think it should be possible to create all kinds of simple mechanical structures, even gears (laminating sheets with glue stick).
The Craft Robo is pretty expensive, and I have no clue what your Roland set you back. I gather yours is a commercial unit, like the kind they have at the mall? The ideal pricepoint for schools might be in the $500 range. I wonder if that is possible, and still get a decent machine?
Beyond that, I have some ideas I'd like to pitch to Parallax regarding some educational materials with precut pieces. More later after I send them a proposal.
-- Gordon
http://www.cricut.com/
You may even be able to find a used on on your local Craigslist.
Robert
These vinyl cutting machines are quite common in Taiwan. Why so? Taiwan makes one third of the world's plastic and we have a very intense sign industry that uses Chinese characters. With the alphabet being roughly 7000 items, you can't afford to stock letters for off the shelf sale - signs are either hand painted or digitally created as every one requires a custom solution. We also have available an incredible selection of Japanese craft/art paper - many colors and wonderful textures.
I do wonder what the cutter is. It would have to be able to handle changes of direction and stay sharp. Are these laser cut or something else?
-- Gordon
BTW, I agree that these cutters are an overlooked resource for doing 3D modeling. Laminar alignment should be fairly easy, too, by cutting round holes in each layer and stacking the layers on dowels.
It's a small knife blade on a pivot with a very slight positive caster so that, when it changes direction, the knife will rotate, dragging the tip behind it. More expensive units have a motor that drives the knife rotation so that it always follows the direction of travel without having to drag a little behind the rotation axis.
-Phil
Very true. The error would be cumulative, so by the end of a series of cuts the blade could be well off course.
Out of interest, does your Roland have the laser or other contour registration feature? IOW, can you cut out on pre-printed paper?
-- Gordon
-Phil
Manually adjusting the registration for each print isn't going to work, so I'll keep looking. Hopefully someone has a product similar to the Robo Pro but isn't saddled with expensive consumables. Thirty five dollars a blade, indeed! (Gotta say that with a Dr. Smith tone in your voice.)
-- Gordon
It would not surprise me at all if other cutters can use Roland blades, since the Roland blade cartridge standard is actually an HP pen plotter standard. Here's a photo of the Roland PC-50 blade cartridge next to an HP 7475A pen:
I can use the pens in the PC-50, and it becomes a plotter. It even uses HPGL. The main difference between it and a plotter is that the PC-50 has a Z-axis pressure adjustment for controlling depth of cut, which pen plotters lack.
-Phil
I was going to do something similar, but changed my mind.
The point is this... I made a fairly nice pivotable blade holder that I probably will never use, and if you make any headway in this project, I would be willing to send it to you, free of charge. Instead of using high dollar blades, the holder unscrews into two pieces, and these blades can be inserted:
http://www.xacto.com/Product/X245
Phil, It seems you just can't escape the Roland's. On further research the USCutter model is too basic (the software is also not up to Roland's standards, IMO). So given what I'm needing to do it's either a Roland DX-24 or it's nothing. Now, I just have to see if I have $1800 laying about... (And yes, I've checked eBay -- these things are in demand, so the prices are pretty high even for used.)
-- Gordon
I'm in the market for a table top vinyl cutter. Read you comment and wanted to see if you can help me.
The problem with doing research on the internet is that it's filled with garbage hype. That's why
I would like to hear from somebody who actually owns one.
Is this true that the software is it still online and you can't use it offline?
I was lucky when I've found a blog post that said it as it is. Actually it's harsher than you would imagine.
My short list included cameo and cricut. This post silhouette cameo 3 compared to cricut was an eye opener.
Good news I got a real review bad news it has put me on the fence. What's your take on it?
Any tip is helpful.
You do realize this thread is 7 years old and some of this information is quite dated?