Diy vinyl cutting & similar fab experience???

[mjwalsh]

We are debating & researching about some less than $300 die cut machines .... mostly between Cameo 3 or a Cricut.* Especially ... for those of us who have or their help has already gotten acquainted with "computer graphics arts" it seems like the not too expensive of printers could make sense.

In other words, it could help open the door for us for more professionally done custom face plates for our equipment & other smaller custom made decals & signage etc.* How ... these material cutting machines which I have never used.* We already have the equipment to use heavy lamination pockets so that could work in conjunction with the DIY die cut printer ... working more precise & less labor intensive than an exacto knife.

Any thoughts?* I know one set of our signs in our laundromat was contracted out for reverse printed vinyl letters on the back of Lexan.* They were done over 25 years ago & they still look 100% like new.* We have a color laser printer that we reverse printed on the back of thin polycarbonate to use as faceplates for our clothes dryers which saved us some serious money because the coin mech manufacturer gave us a much better price since we just adapted their inserts.* That was when we converted so the dryers to accept both dollar coins & quarters.

In fact I am pretty sure that with the die cut's deep blade that thin Lexan (polycarbonate) could even do the openings without needing to spend too much contracting it out to an outfit with a x-y CNC cutting setup.

 

[Main Street Carwash]

My wife swears by her Cameo and she can do an amazing amount of stuff with it.

 

[2Biz]

You might also want to check out USCutter...They have entry level and professional Die Cutters. I have the USCutter SC 24" Model. It was amazingly easy to use and if I remember right, it was less than $300 for the cutter and software.

 

[mjwalsh]

2Biz, Main Street & others,

We would like to do precise shapes for openings for lcd, key switch, push button switch & see thru dial cuts in a gloss paper that is during a second step will have to have similar cuts in the same sheet that is encapsulated with 10 mil laminate. Total thickness no more than 28 mil or .028 of an inch. I am told that maximum thickness tends to be 2 mm or about 78 mil. My concern is the laminate. The Cricut Maker model says over 60 materials including aluminum ... I basically have experience with SVG files within Inkscape ... but zero die cutter experience.

I seems like there may be too many technicalities involved with pre-printing & cutting the gloss paper & then running it through the cutter again to cut the laminated gloss paper without breaking its needed edge seal. We have already proven that we can do a good enough job with a an exacto knife with a 100% sharp blade. I am just trying to get away from too much labor & extra time doing the cutting manually. The Cricut Maker seems like it could have more potential for a much larger variety of even non paper material that might need precisely done openings.

Most of these smaller more portable shape cutting machines remind me of the old dot matrix printer that I had back in the early '80s with the way their operating heads are mounted & move???

 

[2Biz]

Here is a project I did in 2 colors. Black Letters Overlaying a White Back-Ground. It was easier than I expected. Nobody around here does vinyl graphics any more. No money in it. So I decided to do my own from now on. The vinyl holds up real well in the CW environment. But the plastic I used didn't hold up so well, especially in direct sunlight. Next ones I make will be on Stainless Steel. The only limit there is with one of these cutters is the operator!

As for the thickness material the cutter will handle, you'll have to look at the specs of the cutter you buy. I don't know how thick mine will cut. Plus there may be big differences in a vinyl cutter and the Cricut….My wife has a Cricut that she uses to cut card stock for scrap booking. But she's never cut vinyl...Another thing from my understanding, she has to buy plug in cartridges and doesn't have software that is connected to a PC. All projects are done from the tiny screen on the machine. My USCutters vinyl cutter and software works more like using "Microsoft Word" and normal printer drivers for a PC.

 

[mjwalsh]

It was easier than I expected. Nobody around here does vinyl graphics any more. No money in it. So I decided to do my own from now on. The vinyl holds up real well in the CW environment. But the plastic I used didn't hold up so well, especially in direct sunlight. Next ones I make will be on Stainless Steel. The only limit there is with one of these cutters is the operator!

2Biz,

I got on the phone with Cricut tech yesterday (30+ min on hold) & when it came to interpreting the thickness specs ... she finally went to a supervisor to ask. The answer was "if the material can be cut with a scissors" so I am now leaning towards the Cameo 3 with the top software upgrade if I go at all. We are still debating whether to invest the close to $300 & "some learning curve" considerations ... since we recently got such a good deal from buildasign.com on some signs. I provided the hi res file for them a bit like what would happen with whatever die cut machine I would choose to buy.

Nice work on your signs! As far as plastic ... UV resistant polycarbonate tends to be our choice. The right kind of aluminum flat seems like it would be easier to work with than stainless steel. Stainless steel is more chemical resistant though.

No money in vinyl graphics you say ... I am thinking vinyl vehicle wrap is "all the rage" nowadays. But that might be a lot different vinyl materialing process ... not sure ... I don't want to be too naive???

Out of curiosity ... how much did the vinyl material itself needed to cut out your letters cost? Can a person get a good deal on quality vinyl without resorting to some foreign supplier?

 

[MEP001]

No money in vinyl graphics you say ... I am thinking vinyl vehicle wrap is "all the rage" nowadays. But that might a lot different vinyl materialing process ... not sure ... I don't want to be too naive???

He most likely meant vinyl cut and overlaid on another material. People want fast and cheap. A good vinyl material is expensive, the machine is expensive, and it's labor-intensive to put a sign together. Vinyl wraps are just printed - all the labor is applying it.

Have you considered just having signs made? S. Thomas has been making my door decals on Lexan (MUCH more durable than vinyl) for $20 each. If you can give them precise measurements they can cut out holes to match anything.

 

[mjwalsh]

2Biz & others,

We have a local guy who has done some vinyl lettering on my main manager's vehicle that helps advertise the car wash. It says "Follow Me Friends Don't let Friends Drive Dirty" on the back of his diesel pickup truck. The local guy did a very skillful job of it. About a year now ... one of the better things that we did since the manager's vehicle is seen driving & parked quite often around our relatively small city.

Not to take anything away from the same local guy but ... he wanted to put a bunch of large vinyl letters directly on a corrugated white steel 8 foot high fence directly behind our car wash as the customers drive out. On that specific project we passed .... with me explaining that I was "afraidy cat" of too many people who might think they are getting Age-related Macular Degeneration (AMD) after looking at the wavy letters that would naturally follow the contouring of the surface that they would be laid on top of!!!

 

[mjwalsh]

Have you considered just having signs made? S. Thomas has been making my door decals on Lexan (MUCH more durable than vinyl) for $20 each. If you can give them precise measurements they can cut out holes to match anything.

I did a search on "S. Thomas" on Google & they are not showing up???

 

[OurTown]

I did a search on "S. Thomas" on Google & they are not showing up???

http://www.stagraphics.com/index.html

 

[2Biz]

Out of curiosity ... how much did the vinyl material itself needed to cut out your letters cost? Can a person get a good deal on quality vinyl without resorting to some foreign supplier?

I use Oracle 651 Outdoor vinyl....On USCutters website the 15" x 10yd roll is $14.49...You can get a lot of signs out of 30 feet of vinyl!

https://www.uscutter.com/ORACAL-651-Intermediate-Cal-Vinyl-15-x-10-Yard-Roll-Punched

 

[MEP001]

Then the vinyl sign makers are ripoffs - I bought just enough blue vinyl to cover the front of a vendor and they charged $34 for it.

 

[Main Street Carwash]

Good outdoor vinyl will last 7 years or more. Laminating is really only necessary for printed graphics. They sell printable vinyl and most decent cutters can do cut patterns off of registration marks that are printed on the vinyl. If you have an existing decal that already has the cutouts, it can be scanned to make a template for future decals. A decent 24" cutter and printer can make almost anything one would need at a car wash but is an investment that probably exceeds the cost of farming it out twice. A 12" cutter and printer is rather inexpensive and, as long as your decals don't need to be wider than 12", will serve you well. Youtube has a vast amount of info on this.

 

[mjwalsh]

2Biz & others,

We are leaning towards the Cameo 3 if we invest at this point. We have not finalized on any of the 12"x 24" portable die cutters but if we do I assume that as long as we specify "OUTDOOR ADHESIVE VINYL" & be on the look out for bad quality reviews it seems like we will be OK in that department.

Thanks for the tip off on how reasonably priced quality outdoor adhesive vinyl is. It looks like ordering it in the roll format is the best most of the time to get the big price break?

I would think that the non adhesive vinyl would not make any sense to order for our car wash facility decal purposes??? We change our Vac decals from time to time ... I wonder if they would be as good of a quality as ordering from KR? It would open the door to be able to play around on our own with alternative graphics it seems. Even if seams would be needed ... I am not so sure that would be a problem with the more portable die cutters vs the larger US Cutter ones.

I like it when a person can import & integrate precisely scaled photos among other file formats.