The Letterville BullBoard: Possible to cut magnetic on plotter?

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Posted by Shane French (Member # 2098) on :

Okay, i searched for this in the archives, but couldn't find anything on it (good reading, anyway!) :

Is it possible or recommended to cut magnetic sheeting (car magnet stuff) on a plotter?

If so, any tips?

Thanks!
Shane French

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ntshane@yahoo.com

Posted by Jim Doggett (Member # 1409) on :

Hi Shane:

Possible? Yes. Recommended? Most cutter manufacturers would say "no."

That said, what you need to do is apply transfer tape to the back, which serves as a makeshift release liner. As long as the blade depth/pressure is set to cut through the magnetic - BUT not through to your platen protection strip - you're OK.

Other things to consider are how thick the magnetic is. Anything over 30 mil might be tough. Also, you'll need a blade (more than one ... magnetic dulls blades pretty quickly) with a steep enough angle to get through the stuff. Your standard 45 degree blade probably won't cut it (pun intended).

Disclaimer: The above suggestion is provided "as-is" without warranty. I/Summa will not be held liable for damage to your equipment, materials, self-esteem, or anything else. Use the above suggestion at your own risk; and with due caution.

Regards / Good luck,

Jim

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Jim Doggett
Vice President
Summa, Inc.

Seattle, WA USA
jim@summusa.com

Posted by PKing (Member # 337) on :

My question is WHY would you want to?
Sell individual letters?
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PKing is
Pat King of
King Sign Design in
McCalla,Alabama
The Professor of
SIGNOLOGY

[This message has been edited by PKing (edited May 23, 2001).]

Posted by Glenn Taylor (Member # 162) on :

Shane,

If your plotter is a sprocket-fed Gerber plotter, Gerber has a couple choices for magnetic material. However, most plotters have a steel base which makes it difficult for the magnetic material to slide back and forth. To my knowledge, the Gerber enVision 375 is the only plotter at this time that has an aluminum base which allows the material to go through with little difficulty. Beyond that, the weight of the material is the next hurdle. Even the enVision 375 has some difficulty with it. It seems that the tracking holes will stretch out of shape too easily if it is run back and forth too quickly and too often.

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Warning: A well designed sign may cause fatigue due to increased business.
http://members.tripod.com/taylor_graphics
walldog@nc.rr.com

Posted by Dave Grundy (Member # 103) on :

Shane..I know that others have cut magnetic material on their plotters but the thing that bothers me about it is the fact that it is magnetic material, and that it "could" have some effect on the electronics within the actual plotter.

I have no idea what goes on inside that tiny little brain in the plotter but I have chosen not to "challenge" it with a shot of magnetic material.

Cutting magnetic material by hand is so easy that it isn't worth taking the chance of screwing up a plotter.

In case you aren't aware, you can cut magnetic material by just "scoring" it with an x-acto knife, even in a "wavy" line and just flex it once and it "breaks off" perfectly.

ALSO you don't want to be doing intricate cuts on magnetics either...the more "intricate" the outline the better the chance that it will blow off the vehicle at 20 MPH!

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Dave Grundy
AKA "applicator" on mIRC
"stickin' sticky stuff to valuable vessels and vehicles!"
in Granton, Ontario, Canada
1-519-225-2634
dave.grundy@quadro.net
www.quadro.net/~shirley

Posted by Howard Keiper (Member # 1250) on :

Shane...
We (Graphtec) do it a little differently...we simply run the magnetic sheeting through the cutter as you would if you were cutting sandblast mask. The problem usually is that the magnetic sheet sticks to the platten in some cutters.The 4100's have a stainless steel ramp and platten so "stiction" is not a problem. It is necessary to have a tangential capability if the sheet is more than, say, 10 mils thick. Magnetic is usually scored and broken apart rather than cut through, so we recommend a garden variety heavy duty blade, our CB-15-A, 45 degree. Weight can be a problem, so we recommend supporting the material fore and aft if there's significant overhang. Other than that...duck soup.
hk

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Howard Keiper
Sales Mgr., Graphtec
Benicia, Ca.
keip@pacbell.net

Posted by Diane Crowther (Member # 120) on :

Some tips for cutting on a plotter:

(a) use a sprocket feed machine

(b) if you can set your software to cut the pieces in sequential order, it will not be reeling the material in and out willy-nilly. You want as little back-and-forth travel as possible.

(d) babysit to keep the magnetic material from sticking to any steel that is on the plotter..maybe hold a piece of corex or cardboard underneath for it to travel over

(e) the knife depth only has to be set to cut partway through the material (scoring) then you can fold over the cutline and break the pieces out

(f) use a 45 degree blade

This is how we cut the thinner magnetic material on our HS15+ plotter. We usually cut the automag on our old 4B when it can't be cut by hand.

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Diane Crowther, Metaline Graphics Ltd., Nova Scotia, Canada, ID #285

Posted by Pierre St.Marie (Member # 1462) on :

What Howard said. We do this regularly and it works. Just score it deep enough and it separates easily.........BUT you have to have a Graphtec plotter.

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St.Marie Graphics
& Makin' Tracks Sound Studio
Kalispell, Montana
stmariegraphics@centurytel.net http://www.stmariegraphics.com
800 735-8026
We're chiseling every day of the week! :^)

Posted by Wayne Webb (Member # 1124) on :

I'm like Dave, I wonder if the magnetic field of the stuff is powerful enough to affect the plotter's brain?

If it doesn't I'd like to try it too.
Most of the parts, in contact with the material, of my Ioline appear to be aluminum.

Can it have an adverse effect on the plotter?

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"The most beautiful thing we can experience is the mysterious. It is the source of all true art and all science. He to whom this emotion is a stranger, who can no longer pause to wonder and stand rapt in awe, is as good as dead: his eyes are closed." Albert Einstein

Failure to advertise is a lot like blinking in the dark. Nobody, but you, knows what you're doing.

Wayne Webb
Webb Sign Studio
Chipley, FL
850.638.9329
webbsignstudio@digitalexp.com

Posted by Howard Keiper (Member # 1250) on :

Wayne...
I wouldn't worry about the mag sheet affecting your plotter. It COULD affect any floppys or zips you might inadvertently rest on or near it.
hk

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Howard Keiper
Sales Mgr., Graphtec
Benicia, Ca.
keip@pacbell.net

Posted by Wayne Webb (Member # 1124) on :

uh oh..........double post

Failure to advertise is a lot like blinking in the dark. Nobody, but you, knows what you're doing.

Wayne Webb
Webb Sign Studio
Chipley, FL
850.638.9329
webbsignstudio@digitalexp.com

[This message has been edited by Wayne Webb (edited May 25, 2001).]

Posted by Joey Madden (Member # 1192) on :

doesen't the ol'workhorse cut magnetics?

Or isn't that considered a plotter?

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HotLines Joey Madden,47 years in the Classic Art of Pinstriping
Grants Pass, Oregon
Learn something new........
http://members.tripod.com/Inflite

Posted by Jim Doggett (Member # 1409) on :

I agree with Howard! OMG, what's going on here HK?

Floppys and Hard Drives are magnetic media. Put a magnet next to them and a lot of 1s turn to 0s ... or is it the other way around? Thus, you lose your data.

Firmware data (ROMs / NVRAM chips) is not magnetic. So magnetic material can't change the 1s to 0s ... or is it the other way around?

Your plotter brain is safe ... until a power spike hits it.

Also, the make-shift realease liner (Transfer Tape) helps with the "stiction" (Static Friction) too.

Rgds,

Jim

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Jim Doggett
Vice President
Summa, Inc.

Seattle, WA USA
jim@summusa.com

Posted by Howard Keiper (Member # 1250) on :

jim..

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Howard Keiper
Sales Mgr., Graphtec
Benicia, Ca.
keip@pacbell.net

Posted by Howard Keiper (Member # 1250) on :

There was supposed to be a grin there somewhere.
hk

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Howard Keiper
Sales Mgr., Graphtec
Benicia, Ca.
keip@pacbell.net

Posted by Gail & Dave Beattie (Member # 572) on :

we use the tangential (spelling?) knife on the router to cut mag
as to the 'why u'd want to?' question
we sell theses letters & numbers to the airforce for their flight boards, they are the only ones we know of that use this sort of lettering

like dave i never felt good about the idea of puting it thru the plotter... sortof ummmm what if? feeling that comes over ya

regards
gail

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on chat T2

Gail & Dave
NSW Australia

taurus_signs@one.net.au

sumtimes ya just gota

Posted by Shane French (Member # 2098) on :

That's wierd, could have sworn i posted a "thank you" on here, and an answer to the "why would you want to".

anyway, i was mostly curious, because i want to be able to make circular magnets, or ovals. Any ideas on how to do this?

Thanks all!
-shane

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ntshane@yahoo.com

Posted by Jim Doggett (Member # 1409) on :

Ahhh Grasshopper (read: Howard):

Just kidding HK ... everything I know I learned from you! Thanks for wet nursing me when I was new to the industry.

Back on topic: To add a smiley, just type in an emoticon and Ultimate Bulletin Board converts it to a graphic smiley. I.E., a ":" and a ")" is equal to this:

Also, I have a "why would anyone" example. Magnetic lables! In my case, it was some fridge-magnets in the shape of a heart (reminder for my upcoming wedding, with the URL for our RSVP site). We sent out 200+, so doing it on a plotter was a must. I printed white on DuraChrome; applied it to some thin mag sheet that was sent to me as a sample (sorry, don't know the mil); then did an OPOS contour cut. With all the coffee we drink here in Seattle, cutting by hand would have been a bit jaggy ... and taken me all week.

I gotta think there's a good market for short-run magnets. Especially if you're printing and cutting.

Regards,

Jim

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Jim Doggett
Vice President
Summa, Inc.

Seattle, WA USA
jim@summusa.com

Posted by Jim Doggett (Member # 1409) on :

Sorry for the redundancy Shane, you posted while I was typing.

Jim

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Jim Doggett
Vice President
Summa, Inc.

Seattle, WA USA
jim@summusa.com

Posted by Mark Fair Signs (Member # 289) on :

I would guess it would depend on how many circles or ovals you need to cut.

if you have a thousand to do i am almost sure there is a supplier out there who would die cut them for you.
if it amounts to a dozen or so, why not pull out the old exato knife(#11) and cut them.
(you don't have to cut all the way through, simply "score and break")

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Mark Fair

Mark Fair Signs
http://www.markfair.com

Home of "Sign of the Month
http://www.markfair.com/signomonth.html

2162 Mt. Meigs Road
Montgomery, Alabama 36107
334-262-4449

mark@markfair.com

Posted by Pierre St.Marie (Member # 1462) on :

Hey, Joey!.............You're right! I forgot about the 750. We can mount the magnetic to a 10mil flexible Lexan perforated carrier and the old 750 does the same thing.

Posted by Adrienne Pereira (Member # 1046) on :

I was pondering this myself....looking at the interesting sign shapes in Crazy Jack's CD I thought wouldn't those make interesting magnet shapes....anyhoo......
I've made up batches of small magnets with my shop name & ph# (hand cut these) and stuck them to my van.....one by one they disappear (hopefully someone that might call took them...)
I was amazed at how easy they were to cut, just score and snap!
A

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Adrienne Morgan
Splash Signs
www.splashsigns.com
"Rainkatt'on chat

Benicia, CA
707-550-4553
adrienne@splashsigns.com

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