Rodney Gold
Forum Replies Created
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Just get Nortons anti virus 07 and install it on both puters , it will allow you to do so on both and will protect you for a year what with updates etc. Pay the price , it’s cheap and works.
If you have an old puter that doesnt run Xp , you might not be able to use 07 but will have to go down a version or 2.
Its normally a painless install and on a decent machine wont slow you down that much.
Ive tried a few "freebies" but they sometimes a little dodgy , so I just pay around 10 quid for Nortons. -
You need a galvo "YAG" laser to do this without marking paste , you can get em up to 200mm x 200mm marking field size. They are super fast and mark and cut lots of other stuff.
GCC make a good one
http://www.laserproi.com/en/mark_prod_m … 0920042129 -
XNview is free and it shows corel and other vector files
http://perso.orange.fr/pierre.g/xnview/enhome.html -
I cant see the vid (I’m at the Hilton , California atm, their on line facilities are less than stellar) but the 3d laser thing is the result of 2 laser beams intersecting and micro fracturing the substrate where it does so. The 3d modeling is called stereo lithography and there are many systems that can be used , powdered metals , resins, UV sensitive resins , plastics etc. Really only good for prototyping or building masters for molding. Very expensive machines at the moment. They slice the object or 3d drawing and build up the thing in layers ,Its been around for some time tho.
We looked at both systems, I thought the 3d glass thing was pretty much a fad and the big problem was that for volume production , the stuff coming from china would make the whole thing ultra uncompetitive. The stereo lithography is very limited in terms of materials and applications and the models don’t tend to be smooth at all , unless you build a zillion layers which take a ton of time. -
Oops , I meant the Z axis cable , not x axis
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Gert , if the Z axis is acting intermittently , it’s most likely the X axis cable that has a break or a short , try swap cables with another axis to determine it. It could also be the card , swap cards too.
We run ours on Autocad as well as signlab. If you run signlab , you dont need the translation software.
The linear bearing housings are cheap , we actually have a few machines in mothballs and some spares , perhaps I can help. At any rate that are all adjustable at the bearing housing and the bearing rails are adjustable for backlash at the nut that pokes out at the end. We have never had a bearing issue. PS both the bearing that co along the guide rails and the ballscrew ones are adjustable.
Which machine do you have , we have 3x 1m x 500 and 3 x 500 x 500.
Techno-isel in the states also carry parts for em if RS&E is proving sticky.
You welcome to give me a ring bout the laser or the Isels – 021 592-4123.
Im onhly here till 11 today as we closing up , will be open on 15/1 next yr. -
Gert, whats wrong with the Isel, we run 5 of them , the oldest from 86!!
They are pretty good heavy duty engravers. Rubber Stamp and Engraving are the new agents , if your controller is playing up , they can help.
We run a Tekcel with a Perske High frequ spindle as our heavy duty machine. I would run something with local support , don’t think the shop bot is supported in SA. What applications are you looking to do with the machine? -
Check that you have enough vinyl at the end of the piece so it doesnt uncover the back "material out" eye on the machine when it rolls forward to the 3rd cropmark, You can put a piece of masking tape over the eye if its being uncovered. Always leave about 30cm of matereial in front of and behind the printed crop marks.
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An old convection ordinary/oven will do , so long as it gets to 180 deg c , We use old stoves for this, like 10 or 20 quid.
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You do konw od crouse taht you can raed and unerdastnd ayanhting so lnog as ther frist and lsat lteteers are crorcrret 🙂
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I did a similar thing for an art student , she was taking part in an art exhibition to do with what ppl use Cars for . She asked me to vinyl cut scenes that could be sandblasted on the cars windows , i just used photshop to generate gross 1/2tones and traced and cut em.
The scenes were ppl having sex etc in cars , and it was only when you stepped back that things became obvious. It actually looked real cool , was sort of like looking at ppl doing their thing thru steamy car windows.
I did the cutting , but refused to weed or apply , she did that herself , evidently it took over 2 hrs to weed a side window. Took AGES to cut the stuff too. -
Ok here goes , I’m not going to give you specific ideas.
The logo you posted is not readable, that font does it no favours
Your logo should be simple , easy to print , engrave , vinyl cut , laser cut etc,
Glaumer.net means nothing at all in terms of communicating what you do, either use a bye line like "Vehicle graphic specialists" or change the name to something that at least gives the reader some idea of what is is that you do.
make a list of what makes YOU competitive in the field , try identify the key one and try encompass it in your logo.
For example if you offer a cheap and cheerful service , make your log reflect this , if creativity is your bag , then make the logo something creative. If old fashioned service and delivery are your thing , use a nice "Dependable" font , like times roman.
DO NOT use frilly fonts , or funky ones or cartoon characters or cheesy puns or anything tacky unless you want to be thought of as tacky.
Do not use faded drop shadows or fades of any type in your logo , keep it clean and simple and to primary type colours
Do include as simple graphic that can illustrate what you do , like in your case some generic modernish sports type car with dual side stripes clearly being peeled away (as in applying)m would work.A Vinyl cutter seemingly cutting a chequered flag would work too.
The proportions and elements of your logo should follow these rules
Ratio of 3:2 ie a 3" x 2" logo and follow the rule of thirds
http://www.silverlight.co.uk/tutorials/ … hirds.html
for more explanation.
I think you going thru this exercise yourself will be of far more value than me coming up with some arb logo when I don’t know your co and markets and image and approach to business 1/1000th like YOU do .:) -
It has a synrad laser , made in the good ol USA , supposed to have a 20 000 hour life which is absolute bull , we never had more than a yr with ANY laser source at about a 7 hr daily cycle. (1400-1500 hrs)
What blows is the RF card , there are generally 2 in each laser and this needs to be fixed , symptoms are a drop to about 1/2 power and then nada.
Easy to fix and parts are pennies and easily available – however tuning the tube is flippen expensive as you need to do this on the bench and need expensive equipment. Synrad will send you a DIY white paper if you ask nicely , but
this wont help cos you cant tune the 2 RF (Radio Frequ) boards you have fixed.
I assume you sending it to Stan Woolford in Durban. Its highly unlikely it needs regassing. We have gon thru at least 20-24 sources in the time we have been lasering and its never been a regassing issue.
The Cost to repair should be between 4 and 8 grand ZAR.
When you put it back , add extra cooling fans to the enclosure and blow out the laser fins and enclosure regularily . hHat build up is generally the cause of killing the tube.Bad power is certainly a problem with lasers , in terms of killing the tube and in terms of variability in lasering , banding and all sorts of nasties. We use AC-DC-AC power conditioners with ours (3 Explorers and 3 Spirits)
The mercury is imho one of the best "older" gen lasers out there. It’s a pretty rugged workhorse.
You will have to realign the laser when you do replace it , a lousy fiddly task , but worth it in terms of speed and relaibility.
You should be generating at LEAST Zar 2-3k a day with your machine , at least 40k a month so the R8000 should be money well worth spending.
We had FAR more source problems with our Explorers , which use Coherent/Deos sources , also made in the USA. Funnily enough the USA ppl phoo phoo the GCC machines saying they are Chinese imitiations , they arent , they are damn good platforms let down by cheap yank junk.
Engraving supplies in JHB , the agents for your machine are unfortunately very bad to deal with , so if you going thru them , ride em re delivery and status . -
To do 1000mm bends properly , you will have to get a decent machine , the CR Clarke ones are good , its a wire bender and they are by far the best compared to anything else. You could build your own using nichrome resistance wire , but it wont be that cheap
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Once you factor your invoices , the perception amongst your customers will be that you are in cash flow difficulties.
If any supplier factors their book I cease dealing with them forthwith. I made the contract with the supplier and not some arb beasncounter co that has assumed my debt. -
Extruded pex tends to expand in the direction of extrusion , cast will expand equally in all so try use cast (pricier than extruded)
We just make the holes of stand off’s slightly oversize to compensate and dont torque down the retaining nuts/whatever to real tight so it allows for expansion. at the worst you will get a 1% expansion rate over the whole thing , which is about 3cm over its longest dimesion , so you will need about 15mm clearance each side. IE if you doing a 10mm hole , the hole needs to be "slotted" to be 25mm in the side to side direction. The 740mm dimesnion isnt going to be the problem.
I think doing this in clear pex is not a great idea due to the fact you cant hide stand offs and the rear cleaning issues. Advise your client of this. I think 10mm is total overkill for this sign , 5-6mm will be just as good and a hang of a lot cheaper – here in SA , 10mm is way more than double the price of 5mm and of course its way more difficult to process.
What goes on the clear panel anyway? -
See what you can get in a 3m length , 5mm pex would work and be pretty rigid. you will need 4 locators , top , bottom , left and right and these will need to be screwed into a wall etc , however I would rather use mirror tape to hold in position and then used marine silicon sealer for pefm fixing (the mirror tape is only to hold it till the silicon gels)
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Thats exceptionally slow , a 25 watt mercury will cut at 100% power and like 1.4-2 % speed , NOT 0.2
Either your optics are really dirty or damaged , the tube is on its way out or the thing is badly aligned , this is a potent machine if used well and can make you a LOT of money , well over R2 grand a day.
You can download firmware , drivers , manuals etc at
http://www.jorlink.com/page.aspx?page_id=49
and get more tips at
http://www.jorlink.com/page.aspx?page_id=46
Rubber stamsp are a waste of time , smelly and messy and slow and not at all profitable , they also make the morrors and lens very dirty , cleaning once a week is not good enough.
A laser tube should last 10-20 000 hoursYou really should have the machine checked over , they R150 000 machines
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The mecrury is an excellent machine , can do it all , yours is probably 25 or 30 watts which is fine , we upgraded to the faster Explorers and were sorry , the mercuries are far more reliable. There cant be many laser engravers in Namibia , you can make a ton of dosh if you the only one or 2 around.
Would have most likely been a trophy with our name , I dont do 21st stuff , waste of time IMHO.
We havent had the greatest support from the suppliers of our GCC’s lately. (engraving supplies) I do know a lot about the mercuries/drivers/maintenance if you are having problems tho.
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Cut the pex in white , cheap and plentiful , duco spray with the colours you want , use superglue/contact adhesive to hold em together.
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Yeh , Slapstad it is!!
Who do you buy from? Maizeys?What laser do you have? Using it for stamps etc is a severe waste , we have made 3 stamps in 6 years of lasering , PAID , OVERDUE and All goods to be paid for on collection.
Some good laser boards are
http://www.worldofengraving.com (has a live chat thing)
http://www.engravingetc.org
http://www.sawmillcreek.org
and there is a yahoo group for laser engraving , but its pretty much the richtersveld.
I do a ton of custom trophies etc , have a look at my site
http://www.tokerbros.co.za
Im also often on IRC if you ever use it , if you want to chat about anything. -
Gert , the best way is to design in Corel and use EPS to colorip.
For a better idea of what you see is what you get , you would have to have your system colour calibrated , but you will get a far closer representation if you go to colour management in corel and set it to emulate professional printed output , your screen colours will be far more accurate to whats going to get printed.
the rip itself has various intents etc , and if you want to learn more about the RIP and how its settings affect your colours , go to
http://www.wasatch.com/digigrafix.htmlWe have printed a colour chart which gives us various cmyk combos and the ACTUAL colour it prints and thus can match up when we want specific colours or vibrancies etc
http://www.rolanddga.com/rnet30/files/s … pchart.exeApart from that , the RIP itself has an excellent help section well worth reading and there are forums and all manner of other support documents for the rip at rolands site
http://www.rolanddga.com/ , join the inkijet forum there. -
I would buy a Graphtech craftrobo and use inkjet vinyl , use a clear overlam if you want major abuse resistance.
http://www.graphteccorp.com/craftrobo/
They arent expensive , but limited to a4, it seems a good cheap start for small stuff. -
Hiya Gert , im from South Africa , Cape town. Welcome.
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As david says , Any perspex that has been subjected to any process that creates heat in it (like flame polishing , bending , lasering , routing or saw cutting with the wrong bits) will almost certainly stress crack at the heated points if you use meths and some other solvents. This can happen years after it has been processed and the stress cracks can also appear some time after the solvent is used. If the pex used is extruded and not cast , its even MORE problematic in this regard.
Use either safety solvent , citrus oil or benziene to remove the glues. If non of these work , then replace the pex sheet. -
Doming resins are either epoxies or urethanes , the epoxies will give you adherence and bleeding problems , the urethanes wont. 2 part flexible urethane doming is the way to go , but is critcal in terms of 1) mixing ratio and 2) any moisture. Getting either wrong will result in foaming , bubbles or the stuff not gelling. 2 part urethanes will work with your wax based prints for your application.
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Do not buy it , may be cheap short term but it is VERY expensive long term and is not a relaible machine , far eclipsed by the new crop of digital print and cut machines.
Output will cost you 10x the price of stuff like a roland sp300 and it cant do anywhere near as much, It will only be good , when it works properly , for very small stuff. Ours works , but we use it as a doorstop. We got sick and tired of replacing heads and spending fortunes on the ribbons. -
The resin should spread over the item by itself if you get the shot size correct , however I would suggest using a scalpel to "pull" the resin to the edges if it does not get there as well as to pop bubbles prior to the resin gelling. (you can use a needle too)
DO NOT contact the print with the needle or even pull too much resin with it , you might find the print bleeding into the resin. -
They right , there are suggested starting points , but most materials will require a trial and error approach until you have a firm database yourself. There ae various issues ,. such as 40 w is not always 40w , it could be 38 or it could be 45 and the speed of one brand of laser cannot be equated to others. Differing dpi’s will change the speed requirments too
The laser processes a ton of materials and the properies of various materials round the world change.
Always try to run the laser as fast a possible , 100% speed on engraving is a good start point , on somethng like acrylic , i would suggest to start at 50% power , 100% speed , to cut 3mm , I would suggest 100% power and 4% speed. It’s almost impossible to give exact settings. I run 6 lasers and have a lot of experience , so if you have any questions or issues , just ask me and perhaps I can help. -
Laser engraving is by far the best way to mark wooden pens.
Major wow factor , the engraving detail can be held as fine a human hair. Laser engraving wont come off either , but its a single colour.I have a flatbed printer , the busjet , works well these days as a doorstopper, did work quite well at one time.
You have to pre coat the pens prior to marking em with this method but its real cheap to mark , a schlep to precoat tho. -
AutoCad works very well for what you want and it suports most tablets
Older versions are probably fine , 11, 12, 13 or 14 , we used Acad + tablets for ages and did wonderful work. -
Extruded perspex is fine , there is no call for polycarb unless you need it to be somewhat vandal and impact resistant
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We dome around 5000 items a day , very profitable work. Print and cut here goes for about 30 quid per sq meter m. Print , cut and dome goes for round 280 quid a sq meter. Doming resins cost around 10 quid a litre and 1 ml will cover around a sq inch , ie 1 litre will do 1000 sq inches (which is about .7msquared)
Doming is a little odd , there are basically 2 ways , either handguns and carts which is extremely expensive but usefull for small qtys and the occasional job , or one has to set up a dedicated environmentally controlled facility and buy some very expensive mixing and dispensing equipment.
Prime consideration when doming is to do it in a dry warm environment, moisture in the air is guaranteed to give bad results like foaming or bubbling. Same applies when leaving the domes to dry , warm moisture free!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!There are about a zillion uses for domed items. We use a polyurethane (the most difficult in terms of environment) that is semi flexible , so our domed decals can be put on curved surfaces. Used for branding all sorts of items , decorative stuff , car decals , inserts for medals and other spun cast products , protection against all sorts of abuse etc.
In reality , one is limitied to the area one can dome , the smaller the decal the better the dome. big areas are problematic as the dome sinks in the middle.
Domed items sell themselves , they look fantastic and have a wonderful tactile feel about em.
The kits are cheap , you might as well get one and try , I beleive mockridge in the UK is the place to get em. -
I suggest you stay well clear of this machine , regardless of cost etc. In the long run compared to a small inkjet print and cut , it dies an economic death. parts are getting scarce too. Running costs of a PC60 are roughly 10x+ the costs of my Roland inkjet, even more if you factor in head replacements , wasted prints etc. You dont have to do a lot of work to recoup the higher capital investment in an inkjet,
In terms of digital printing experience , the roland will not aid you that much in that it is not the same as normal inkjet printing.
I have reduced my pc60 to being used as the 2nd doorstop , my old pc50 is no 1 doorstop!! I dont think you will make money or grow your business with this machine in todays climate of inexpensive digital print and cut inkjets. 5-10 yrs ago , it was a different story cos inkjets capable of doing what the pc could did not really exist or were horrendously expensive.
At the end of it all , thermal resin printing has been far exceeded by inkjets. We started with the pc series and went on to full colour inkjet and soon realised what we had been missing , my application is mainly very highly detialed contour cut decals (most of which are domed) which in theory is an ideal application for the pc60.
Here in South Africa , a pristine working pc600 goes for under 1000 quid 2nd hand and even at that price , they struggle to get sold. -
Spot on , don’t buy it.
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I think the reasons Roland dont do full solvent or offer the option is manifold
In the first place agressive solvents are a lot harder on components , especially if they werent designed for them
I am under the impression that to use the Epson Dx3 heads , Roland have to abide by an agreement to use Epson inks.
The full solvent inks are considered hazardous and there is Eu legislation that limits transport and the use of them , either its current or being tabled. Possibly the same world wide
Roland make money selling inks and media
Roland warrant their output on their approved media using their inks , using aftermarket is beyond their control.
I think they would be silly to offer anything than what they do , they have tried and tested it and it works , what possible motive can there be for them to sanction something they have to spend a lot of R&D money for and run the risk of having hassles with?
Obviously as consumers we would like the best of all worlds.
There really is one reason only to go with aftermarket inks and that is cost . The only time you will beneift is with a bulk ink system and a printer that works all day long , every day and you are competing in the bulk order market.
if you want a solvent machine , why not buy one designed as solvent from the word go? -
Same machine , different label. Works brilliantly when it works , however it stopped working after a while. Dont buy it – we burned our fingers. Never made real money with the machine and spent a lot trying to get it to work properly without clogging the heads. We been offered a free t-shirt printer conversion or a new inkset that requires no coatings by the agents , will take em up on the offer at some time
Its easy to line stuff up, just make jigs for em. , you can print a grid on the table and line the jig up to the grid.
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You can’t be competitive even if you did do them , conventional printing would be the best way for this. You might as well use vinyl if you are gonna do em tho.
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We have a Golden cocker (barbie) shown here , a black one which I dont have a decent pic of (Ken), and a cat that is ALWAYS cross (Ginger)
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Corel X3 has a Fillet/Chamfer/Scallop docker that does this , its very useful , especially for vinyl cutting where you often need to round corners of sharp objects
Corel X3 is a VERY worthwhile upgrade
Lots of fantastic features that makes life easy for engravers, signage etc -
We would normally do that ,do em all and hold em in stock , problem is when they all not the same , IE have to be produced on demand and we werent told that. Its like someone orders 1000 post box nos , all different , and instead of getting em all , you get like 100 numbers a month , but they all been paid for – arrrgh!!
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I don’t quite get it , surely the laser cut panels have something behind them , if not the whole face of the lightbox would have open sections?
If there is a supporting back structure like an opal , 3mm is not a problem in terms of structural rigitiy if applied to em.
It is most likely cut in sections anyway as you dont get pex in 20′ ft lengths and lasers that size are not common so its probably not a single 20×4 panel?.
Some colours of pex also only come in 3mm thicknesses so that might have been a reason it was used.
When you say its splitting , is it broken in parts or are there stress cracks?
If you do do this job , then be VERY careful of ANY solvent near laser cut pex , the stuff is incredibly stressed from lasering and solvents will immediately make the pex craze or stress crack in this case. This can happen YEARS down the line , not just riight after its cut.The worst jobs to do in our experience are those that involve fixing other folks mistakes – we have never made a decent amount on em and often never gain the customer cos they begrudge having to pay YOU to fix it. These jobs always involve having to go to the customer a few times and explain further problems that have cropped up and ppl resent that too.
Also difficult to quote on due to the unforseen. They are ALWAYS messy , as you have discovered.I think theres no dilemma , this job sounds like "T"rouble and I doubt you need that , so IMHO , you should walk away and decline to quote explaining your concerns.
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Yes, it does give the inks a metallic look , and you can vary the metallic look with your inkloads as well as the type of substrate you print , the best is mirror silver for this.
Some of the mirror Metallics wont accept inks , but there are 2 workarounds
1) spray artists fixative on the metallic
2) Overlam the metallics with Clear and print the clearAnd a 3rd one , and that is to buy a coated mirror vinyl (we get ours from Starrex/X-film
I would also limit this to small stuff if you printing mirror , big stuff has a sort of wavy look due to the vinyls , ie the reflective surface is not dead flat.
You can actually print on other substrates for this with different properties
Rowmark make a substrate called laserlights , it has a wonderful shiny brush finish and is self adhesive and can be vinyl cut , its a mil spec material with extremely strong adhesives and the silver and gold can be printed very nicely , expensive and small sheets , but the look is wonderful , fantastic for small durable decals that need a bit of thickness. -
In case no 1 , you most likely came off as too expensive and even tho he did ask for a "quick quote" , he probably wanted more , like "improvements" on his design. It could have been that he was dissatisfied with his existing supplier and was just trawling for others , they might have kissed and made up?
In case no 2 , you have to decide what your business strategy is , whether you are willing to invest time into a job without reward and take a chance you get the job , or be a stickler and demand a deposit up front.
Albeit its difficult , we will only do designs on acceptance of a quote , but have to provide some sort of pre quote visual or description for the client.
You cant really quote properly if you dont have at least the major elements of the job.
If you have enough work to keep you busy and dont need the customer , you can take the route where you refuse to do anything prior to deposit or acceptance , if you need the business , you then have to do the design it first thing and write off the time you put in with no reward as school fees.
What you really have to ask yourself in this regard is what sets you apart from anyone else out there. In terms of signmaking , what generally sets one apart is creativity , the ability to know what materials are suitable , to do the job with quality and deliver on time at a fair price.
In essence what will really put you above the crowd is your creativity and if thats the situation , you have to demonstrate it.
Your customer wants something to boost their bottom line , no matter what type of signage and your job is to maximise that for the customer in whgichever way you can , you are the expert , so the customer relys on you.
No use being p—d of with ppl that steal your designs and have em done elsewhere , you will never stop that and to pursue remedies is often futile , it just costs too much and creates bad blood. As suppliers to a customer , you have to eat crow often and pretend to smile and like it – thats the reality. -
Its the same co that advertsing all the lasers , Rabbit or something like that.
60w is plenty for Co2 lasers as engravwers , but power is not the determinant of whether a laser is good or not, these are "flaky" machines at best and the determining factor of what brand to buy is the support you get …….in the case of these lasers its ZILCH!!!
You wont be able to do steel at ALL with 60w , or 80w or 100w , you gonna need high quality tubes and least 200-500W of GOOD co2 power and even then , you aint gonna cut any really thick metal at all , maybe 2mm steel?
Im pretty experienced with lasers , we run 6 in our shop and as attractive as the chinese machine was in price , poawer and bed size , I chose to pass as i dont beleive it is at all capable of precise repeatable production and based on the manuals , pictures and software I saw , looks to me like BIG TROUBLE!!
We do use lasers made in China , but they are similar in cost and construction to "western" brands are are better in some respects , GCC units (called Laserpro in the USA)
You would expect to pay at least US$20k for a decent 700mmx 480mm laser with a decent (synrad or Coherent DEOS) souce in the 30W bracket.
The mnfgr of the $4k chinese units stopped responding to my mails when my questions on the machine got specific bad sign very bad. -
Shane , Colorip is the Wasatch RIP , you arent goiing to get much better than that unless you spend silly money , its a VERY good rip.
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How do you possibly expect to get that machine at that price , the heads are epson Dx3 heads and they alone cost about the price of the whole machine. This is obviously a scam
The lasers from China are real and they are quite cheap , but you get what you pay for – glasss tubes with lousy beam quality , constant alignment issues and the chiller cooling system is an aquarium pump , poor quality stepper motors etc.
When I started asking a few pertinent questions about the machines , we never got a reply
Subsequently I was contacted by an agent that imports em here , but even he is a total rip off , FOB price of a laser from mnfgr at $4k (around R32 000) and he is selling at R130 000 , like 300+% profit
I do know ppl that have bought stuff like cmputerised overhead routers from the same co that does mnfgr the lasers and are happy. -
Check your RIP or printing program is set to print BOTH raster and vector
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Hugh , what times were you running? I used to race a 67 Camaro with a blown methanol injected 454 , Powerglide 2 speed box and got down to a best of 7.8 secs.
My 70 Camaro with normally aspirated 454 did mid 10’s on slicks and mid 11’s on street tyres. I had a th400 box in it , but had the option of full auto or manual only (IE you could take off in 3rd) and on the street used to ride in one gear only as going down to 2nd or g-d forbid 1st , resulted in some really hairy corners if you hit the gas.
Did you have a Hemi in the charger?
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If you got the grunt , then auto is way better , it can handle more power and has torque multiplication which a manual box doesnt have. Most of my stuff is V8 and a manual is waste of time cos of the low end torque.
If you got someing like a peaky hig revving engine , then manual is better IMHO , I used to have one of those Honda VTECS that used to rev to 8700 , an auto would have killed it.
If you drive heavy urban and bumper to bumper traffic mainly , I would never consider anything but an auto
My BEST vehicle I have ever ridden is auto only , a Honda silverwing 600cc scooter.
Autos are set to revolutionize biking , what with soaring fuel and traffic costs and a lot more old farts like me wanting to get on a bike wiuthout the hassles of clutches and gears , big cc auto bikes are the answer (well not strictly auto , CVT) -
Well the one in the pic has had a 350 cu in transplant , I get about 5-6km per litre in it , however I dont drive a lot , basically a 15-16km round trip a day to work and back. If its nice weather , I normally take my scooter (600 silverwing) which gets around 18km/l , so it all sort of balances out to a normal fuel usage.
These were called Chev El caminos here in South Africa , still very much in demand as tow vehicles for caravan and boat owners and recently very much the rage for "street" fighter type pickups. A good original example is cheap here , round $4k Aussie , a comparative Chev lumina SS pickup is $60k Aussie!!!! , even a simple 1.6 litre Ford bantam 1/2 tonner is like Aus$26k.
The one in the pic was one I converted to a yank V8 some 12 years ago , had a nitrous system and was doing low 10 sec 1/4 miles , sold it and saw it advertised about 4 months ago and bought it back for old times sake.
I had put in power steering , elec windows , aircon , changed the whole steering column to a ford’s , put in decent seats , good brakes , tropical radiator , turbo 350 box , limited slip diff so its pretty decent to drive compared to stock. It doesnt go as well these days in terms of acceleration , but its real fun to pick up some yuppie in a eurotrash hot hatch or a Riceburner or M series beemer and totally humiliate em robot to robot . Best of all , they got beat by a 40+ yr old vehicle that probaly costs less than their in car hifi system. I still get a hell of a lot of complimentary comments on the vehicle, despite its 2 go fast stripes (which I hate – they look so tacky)
I have another HQ ute , absolutely original , which I have just sold.
I really love V8 stuff , I let my wife drive the moms taxi/normal type car (renault scenic) and I drive the cheap "toys".
My ultimate "toy" is my 1980 Corvette which I am completely doing over , it’s been 2 years in the shop , but should be ready before the end of the year. At the end of it all , all the motor car "toys" including the vette and the money I have spent on it , have cost me less than a new 1600 Toyota corolla and are a hell of a lot more fun to drive. -
Wow , turning out to be a bad few days for well known Aussies…..
I used to race a car (drags) with a holden 308 motor and currently have 2 hot rod type Holden utes so Im in some ways a dyed in the wool aussie petrolhead.
http://www.drgfinger.fotopic.net/c1033010.html -
My 10 year old daughter was VERY VERY upset , cos when we were in Aussie in Dec at his zoo, he and his kid stopped their scrambler and spoke to her. That and having her pic with a Koala (which peed on her) were her highlights of her holiday.
Her first words after hearing of his death were about how sorry she felt for his wife and kids.
A good man taken early. -
On reading this thread , I did realise it would probably have been easier to use my signlab and photocut for this job , but the customer wanted a dot type 1/2 tone and didnt really want the detail too high.
I havent got pics as all I did was cut the vinyl , I refused to weed or apply it
The job was acutally a pain in the ass as the gal didnt have money and I quoted on time in respect of a small test piece. so I lost money on the job , but wrote it off to my social contribution in terms of struggling "artists"
It was for an exhibition of what ppl use cars for and I thought it quite appropriate – Im sure most of us have at least canoodeled or bonked in a car. -
I just did a project for an art student where we had to cut vinyl masks for blasting pics of ppl shagging in cars on a cars windows , like you were looking into a car and could see the ppl inside having it off.
We started out with a picture and converted it to a 1/2 tone black and white bitmap with a VERY gross screen and used a round 1/2 tone pattern (used Corel X3 for this bitmaps/mode /baack and white)
We didnt want any single dot to be LESS than 3mm in diameter as it would be difficult to cut and weed.
Once we hot the bitmap to the state we wanted , we used Corel X3’s line art trace and fiddled with detail and smoothing and traced the dots etc. We used the outline of the trace as the cut file.
The panels took forever to cut and thank g-d we didnt have to weed it as there were many entities in the cut file.
Our biggest problem was the order the machine was cutting the dots in , it was jumping around all over the place cutting one here and one there etc and the material was feeding back and forth. The biggest panel was 1.45m x 700mm and it took 2 hours. -
Its not complex , but its not that easy.
I currently do up to 5 000+ of these on a daily basis and have set up a facilty.
The small hand doming units are great for occasional use but the cost of the resins in them is horrendous which makes the profitability of domed items unattractive.
There are also pitfalls in terms of materials that are used.
If you want domes that will last , not yellow, not dull , not get tacky or scratch and are slightly flexible you have to use urethanes and not epoxies , urethanes are difficult to work with and doming has to be done in a warm dry environment.
No matter what resin you use , moisture is your enemy – the key to success is DRY environment – I cannot stress this enough.
We sell domed decals at between gbp 270 and gbp 450 per sq meter. A run of 500 decals your size would sell for 25 pence a piece.
If you want to do this type of process in qty , you need a dispensing and mixing machine as well as a dosing system , IE the resins which are 2 part need a machine that combines em in the correct ratio and mixes em without introducing bubbles of air and then a system to deliver a specific amount of the mixed resin to the item to be domed. A decent system will cost around 4-5000 (quid) , a simpler system 2 000 quid
The graphic if done on a print and cut machine will not cost more than 10 quid per sq meter and the resins are about 10 quid per litre and 1ml of that will cover approx 1 sq inch or 6 sq cm.
Cost of production of these is thus under 30 quid per sq meter with a minimum selling price of 250 quid per sq m , so you can see that this is a highly profitable thing to do.
There are tons of uses for these domed decals and huge markets for them. all manner of items can be branded with them , used for manufacturing badges , promo keytags , car decals , trophy and medal inserts and so on.
Read the threads here for more info
http://www.engravingetc.org/forum/threa … &folder=33
Doming is a VERY nice additional process if you already have a print/cut machine -
Check the blade holder for freedom in rotation or change it , the metal one is the best , apart from that , check your cutting strip , if its not totally smooth or if its scored , change it.
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The percentages the machine shows are meaningless , the cart resets the counter to 100% if taken out and reseated. So if you have ever removed a cart – your display of ink remaining is all cockeyed.
The only sure way is weigh a full and then an empty cart and weigh yours to work out ink left. The newer gen machines have a way of reading the cart chip (all carts now have chips) to monitor ink levels , I also think this chip thing is to stop aftermarket carts being used.
Usage will be round 12-18 ml per sq meter of all inks on a prety heavily printed banner – a little more with full dark solid coverage. -
Suggesting a laser is application specific , we use 1m x 500mm Laserpro Explorers and Laserpro Spirits , all 30w.
These are general engraving lasers and dont have any form of crop mark recognition built in but are extremely versatile machines , round about EU 18k or so. You can feed material from front to back , so end up with a max processing capacity of 1m wide by however long you want , however the engraving area is only 1m x 500 , so if you feed stuff in , you got to panelise the job , sometimes difficult for coninuous long cuts. To slice up the small stickers is easy tho. Using one of our type of machines will expand what you can do BIG time , however it is not ideal for paper die cutting as registration can be fiddly (we made templates)There are some substrates that lasers dont like and PVC (vinyl) is one of them , however kiss cutting sign vinyl will not produce the toxic gasses engraving or cutting thick PVC will.
<200w CO2 lasers wont cut metals at all tho.
Ideally you would want something that can recognise crop marks and has a Roll feed feature if you plan on processing label stock in any big way and this would most likely be one of the bigger and more expensive machines.
Beam Dynamics and Kern lasers have the machines that would be ideal , but are up there in the high priced stratosphere.
I can just tell you that a 30-50w Co2 laser , if used creatively and marketed , can make you a ton more money than a digital printer can.
If you combinbe the lasers capabilities with a print and cut device , you can really go to town with cutting substrates the print goes on. The laser by itself is a huge profit generator in many fields , for example instead of suppling the print that goes on a acrylic POS item , you can laser cut and fabricate the WHOLE item. -
Its pretty easy , there is a freeware program on engraving etc that will allow you to insert text files with correct spacing etc , much like print merge
(Very useful macro indeed)
http://www.engravingetc.org/forum/messa … msg=4435.1
and heres another for cut and pasting
http://www.engravingetc.org/forum/messa … msg=4563.1You can use print merge too , heres a VERY good explanation of how to use it with variable text)
http://www.engravingconcepts.com/swf_fi … ergeB.html
http://www.engravingconcepts.com/swf_fi … ergeC.htmlAll you have to do is use Human readable text and then use corel to convert it to a barcode font
The lams dont really affect the barcodes unless you use something like full matte or wheatgrain.
Be careful of inklaydown , use the highest res your printer is capable of and try minimise edge bleeds . if your heads are adjustable , use the lowest setting and above all use PREMIUM vinyl , we find Starrex from X-film the best for printing on as it has the best detail , however for the ultimate detail , the old coated vinyls that used the non solvent based inks is way and above the best. -
That sounds like a LOT of money for a machine that can only do straight cuts. The high tech trend in processing labels etc is laser based tho big sizes would be a problem as you need roll feed or large table sizes that would increase your cost significantly. You wont need high powered stuff , a 25-50 w Co2 would enable you to cut real fast. some have optical recognition devices that will read crop marks and cut accordingly. You can do incredibly complex cuts and even indeed engrave , perforate, weld and kiss cut with lasers. You could for example engrave and kiss cut paper for serialised labels or slice thru 1/2" acrylic , cut card , leather , foils, wood , cork etc. The laser never contacts the work either.
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What is the price of a machine like that? The 30" version?
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A laser would be ideal for the backing cuts , but its pricey (But can be used for a zillion other things) , we also use rotary cutters and paper guillotines for your type application albeit we do have lasers as the positioning and registration on the laser is a bit fiddly for short run straight cuts.
Perhaps an easier way on your SP300 is to cut the label and then cut the "outer" (the sticker + paper) a little deeper so it cuts the vinyl and scores the backing which would leave a visible "line" in the backing for your rotary trimmer/cutter to follow.
The downside of this method is the fact that the paper backing is highly abraisive and will shorten cutter life significantly , apart from which , peircing the paper on occasion will score the teflon cutting strip which will affect further cutting. -
Yeh , I can never get a real nice green or orange on my printer , I recon go for it if you got all the tech support.
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What RIP are you running and what profiles are you gonna use?
Roland dont supply OG inks for the 540 and the profiles etc would be what worries me in this regard , I wouldnt want to have to reprofile.
Why are you going of OG, are you having hassles with cmyk ,lc,lm inks? -
We do tons of this type of work.
Buy a small digital print and cut machine , like a roland SP300 , which prints and cuts vinyl , buy a small overhead gantry type router/engraver for cutting the blanks and combine the 2.
You cnc cut the substrate slightly bigger than the decal , and digitally print and die cut the decal , apply the decal and then dome the whole bang shoot.
Works absolutely wonderfully if you use a good urathane based 2 part doming resin , no bleed etc. You can also just dome the decal without a backing for flexible domed stickers , do signage jobs and a whole lot more with these 2 machines. Wont be cheap , but there are a zillion other applications for em. -
Firstly one machine will not fullfill both your requirements
You would need at least a 100-200W large field CO2 laser to do the die boards and would need either a small robust overhead gantry type engraver or a small computerised mill to do the foil block (easier to etch)
I would start out with a 30-50W co2 laser and see where it goes from there.
Heres a good article I wrote that will give you some idea what you could do with a laser like that.
http://www.engravingetc.org/forum/messa … msg=1617.1
For what you want to do , you would need Coreldraw for the laser and a program like Artcam , Mastercam or the like for the foils. The laser works in the XY plane and the mills will work in the xyz plabe and the software used to drive them requires some serious toolpath stategies so thus must be able to run the machine and generate the toolpaths , acad cant do that. -
I would never phone the authorities to come check it out , kinda like Phoning the taxman for an audit 😉
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I suppose if you can call organised Chaos being sorted out ….:)
China is problematic , we are losing smaller orders to em as their quality has gone up , prices are artificially low and lead times have dropped and even orders that are in the $500 range are now acceptable. I doubt the situation is gonna remain like that , some pricing is under the international materials costs.
However in the interim , while the west dickers around in regional wars , decreases its workforce productivity and is willing to overlook bad labour proctices for the price of cheap consumer goods , China has waged an economic war and has won and it’s too late to stop the juggernaut. -
The machines print mechanics and engine is based on an Epson 1290 printers innards.
It cant print t-shirts in it’s current configuration , but can if you change the inks and add an attachment.
I hage no idea of how long it takes or the durability as ours has not been done yet. Print speeds are the same as the 1290 do undoubtedly it would take as long , 2-3 mins for an A4 at decent quality. I know you have to heat press the t-shirt after.
I have no idea of what materials it will or will not work on. My machine is basically useless right now so anything that can make it generate income is ok to me. -
At that price it might be worth a look , we paid about 5000 quid for ours at todays exchange rate. Was about $10k in the states.
Its an epson 1290 printer that has been converted. -
We moved to bigger premises , but kept the old one for large scale signage fabrication and very dirty processes like acid etching , sand blasting , welding , grinding , spray painting, screen printing etc. We moved out 3 weeks ago finally as I have canned a few processes and we were only using about 100m square out of 500 , we reorganised our new premises and built a little on to gain the space. I have stopped vehicle signage , large scale signage like billboards and massive fascias , screenprinting etc. We have moved pretty big time into Point of sale display fabrication which is far more profitable than those areas and requires far less infrastructure. We just got 3 new lasers to boost production in that regard.
Rigging costs were killing us in the large scale signage dept despite the profitability on mnfgring and we cant really afford a full scale rigging dept along with all the capital expenses it entails
Screenprinting has become so cutthroat here , what with a whole host of garage type operations undercutting us and vehicle wraps/graphics etc have become the same withjust about EVERY small signmaker/single owner signage bus having a print and cut and everyone after a slice of the same pie.
In fact we are also considering abandoning any extraneous digital printing as we do a ton for our own use (the days of digiprinting being a licence to print money are long gone) -
Ours worked well for a while initially but we have had incredible problems with it , its the BUSjet that has just been relabled
Maybe the later models have sorted out some problems but despite my early enthusiams , ours turned out to be a total lemon. We replaced countless heads, dampers , pumps , capping station and had a ton of problems with the motion system. When it does work , it is fantastic. There were 5 or 6 of these sold in my country and as far as I know , no user has been happy or had excellent service out of theirs.
Right now ours is being converted to a direct T-shirt printer which might or might not make us some money (its being done free) but its better than the lump of metal it currently is. -
Well , we have 6 lasers and 3 "blowers" , 2 lasers are connected to each blower and then we use PVC pipes up the wall to about 8-9 m in height and just vent there.
In our old premises we had our neigbours complain , but it was rediculous as we were doing the same thing , but they were a linen co that stored unwrapped linen in a shed in the yard we vented to and complained about the smell of wood burning in the yard – we only had 2 lasers at the time and hardly did wood.
The owner of the business was an argumentive confrontational twerp who complained about ANYTHING- parking , noise , garbage – you name it , he complained – only stopped when I caught him in the yard having it off with one of his female employees and made pointed remarks to him that his wife might not like to hear about it.They called all the relevant authorities and eventually after being hassled by these authorities , I told the last one to quit harrasing us "Either charge me with a contravention or F— OFF"
We had had output sampled and measured by all the authorities , health , environment , pollution etc and not ONE of them found the lasers output a contravention of ANYTHING let alone any toxicity. A car puts out more pollutants and they are worse than what a laser outputs.
Obviously there are some materials that DO put out toxic fumes , like lasering PVC which puts out chlorine etc. But you wouldnt use these anyway. -
So long as you evacuate the laser fumes effectively you should be ok , a PVC pipe with the exhaust above or at roof level should be 100%. If you really run into problems , an odour scrubber should reduce all emissions or minimize em.
In all likelyhood you could proably vent thru an open window with no problems unless you do stuff like rubber stamps or PVC or a ton of wood. -
There is generally at least 20-25ml left in the carts and from time to time , we use a large syringe to suck out the remaining ink and inject it into one cart , often get an almost full cart. It’s a messy process and you run the risk of puncturing the bladder of the nearly full one. Not sure of the environmental ramifications , but we dispose of spent carts via the guy that collects and recycles all our brass , metal and perspex/plastic scrap.
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The opal Pex will block a large percentage of uv light so uv radiation wont be an issue but it will NOT flouresce under uv (like ladies underwear does at discos)
We spray paint flourescent tubes if we want light of a particular colour and it works real well.
A real nice way to do that sign would be to sandblast 6mm clear pex , apply the letters and edge light it top and bottom wth LEDS and the blasting and lettering WILL flouresce (provided you have enough LEDS with a decent spread)
Will be very slimline too. -
Just to clarify , its only the metallics that are not for exterior use.
Heres a pic of some metallic traffolyte engraving
http://www.tokerbros.co.za/engarved_amp_fascia.jpg
http://www.tokerbros.co.za/dial1.jpg
http://www.tokerbros.co.za/traffolyte_and_perspex.jpg
http://www.tokerbros.co.za/Stakeng.jpg -
Traffolyte is a Phenolic resin core with either a solid resin cap (colours) or in your case , a brushed aluminium skin. I use tons of it , wonderful material BUT it is NOT for exterior use at all – the silver pits and the gold fades.
You HAVE to use tungsten carbide bits with it and ideally a single flute "d" bit (engraving type cutter) This stuff is highly abraisive to cutters.
Feed rates need to be quite high. It should engrave black and the reason it might be greyish is probabaly cos you are using too slow a feed rate and too high a spindle speed and this to some extent are burning the core material , the cutters MUST have large clearance angles so as to evacuate swarf big time.
You can use something like Shell Dromus – a water soluable cutting fluid when machining it (use it neat) , however dry processing is fine too.
How to get the engraving black – well thats quite easy , spray it with spray and cook , pledge or apply a furniture oil after – the oil makes the engraving real black.
The coloured version of this is an excellent media , its fire proof , scratch resistant , solvent and acid resistant etc , one problem with the material is that it becomes brittle over time. The white cored version has a problem with core discolouration too. Its easily panit filled BTW – both ally and coloured versions. -
Use one of the thicker white medias , ask your sign supplier for this. there is a fly in the onintment however as the inks tend to thin the vinyl when printing high area coverage. Easiest is to supply the decal with application tape or overlam and cut thru both decal and overlam for a nice sturdy sticker.
Problem with cheaper thcker media vs top quality cast polymeric is that they dont print as well generally speaking. -
Laserbits in the USA sell sheets of stamp rubber , as does Trodat/Trotec (europe based)- You get 2 grades , the laser friendly variety and the cmmon garden variety
Engraving rubber stamps with a laser is , imho , a not so profitable business , it’s slow , its messy , it’s smelly and there is a lot of work involved to make one stamp which cant be sold for enough money to justify it. The polymer based systems are far cheaper for multiple stamps than the laser can be. We have 6 lasers and in the 8 yrs I have been doing lasering , I have done a handful of stamps for ourselves only.
Perhaps things are different where you are in terms of profitability. -
Those file sizes are huge , you should have more than enough pixels , something sounds wrong there ? You sure you not trying to print a preview ?
!t the size you wanna print , you need about 15 pixels per inch or round 600 per meter or so
Your file size in pixels should be like 2400 pixels by 6000 pixels for an acceptable print bearing viewing distance in mind.
There might be a resized embeded JPEG in the psd file tho , if thats the case you can do nothing barring interpolation or adding some gaussian noise to smooth the pixelated file (which will cause it to lose definition) -
No , but I did a lot of investigation and am still considering one.
Basically these are rather primitive lasers compared to machines costing 10x more , I looked at the software and users manuals (bad translations – but hats common for machines from china)
The mechanics seem ok , rails and bearing I know and there were some surprisingly well made parts , the laser source would be somewhat suspect , but they are $125 to replace and are rated for 3000 hours , about 4 months, I think they decrease in power over time. I was a little bothered by the fact that I think the lasers alignment would be a worry , a fiddley but achievable process and I dont think the beam quality would be great. Stepper motors not servos etc.Software was messy and klugy , but thats not that relevant , one can design in other programs and just use it to drive the laser. Lots of bells and whistles and "make life easy" things missing. It comes supplied with everything tho , pumps for water circ , exhaust blowers and so forth.
Basically , if I bought one , I might throw away $6K inc shipping.
IF the thing works 1/2 as well as my existing ones at 1/2 the speed , it would be worth it and if you really think about it , the machine has to be considered a disposable. If it could be serviceable for a year , well I could easily afford to dump it.
I did the sums , Apart from value added products (like cutting acrylic for our acrtylic fab section) where laser time cant be measured in $X per min and profits are much higher , I would average about 25 GBP an hour with it and would prolly average 150 a day , 700+ per week , or about 2500 a month , over twelve months thats 30k — for a 4.5 K GBP investment. Apart from that the bed size is useful , my top size is 1m x 500 , this is 1200 x 600 so can do a little larger jobs.
At the worst , it will cost me the machine to find out about it first hand???
Dunno , I have a few other issues right now that need sorting out as Im trying to get my Co to run well without me being there constantly so thats kinda taking a lot of my time and effort. The new laser is something I would personally have to be involved in wiith setup , testing , programmingetc – I don’t feel like it right now:)
What has bothered me is communication with the co that makes em , very rittle engrish spoken and tardy replies to mails etc. -
You really need to have a look at your requirements if you are spending that type of money.
What are you engraving?
Do you need routing?
What about a laser?
What is wrong with your old machine?
do you need 3 axis interoplation?
What spindle will be best? and so forth.
I have 3 Isels , a small Roland , a very large Tekcel , pantographs and 6 laser engravers , all do different things.
As an aside Have a look at the machines coming out of china , perhaps not that sophisticated but like 1/5th or less of the cost of the "traditional" machines and they do the job quite well. To give an example a 80w laser with a 1200x 600mm bed size is around $4000 from china vs at least $35k from a traditional supplier. Even if the machine only lasts a year , it is a bargain.try http://www.alibaba.com and search for engravers.
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X3 is marvellous for signmakers , it is a fantastic and a no brainer upgrade.
the trace alone is worth it , but the photopaint knockout lab . create boundry in draw as well as the smart fill and a whole host of other little features make it a bargain. -
Hiya and welcome.
One thing you can look at is laser cutting this stuff and other reflective materials , often the laser can do what no cutter can. Find someone near you with a laser cutter to "expand" your services. Some of the reflectives can also be laser engraved , like the silver material type stuff from 3m , so you can get some fabulous detail as well as shapes. The big advantage for you is that you can cut reflectives that do not have a carrier and are not self adhesive.
Regards
Rodney -
I have never seen a diamond bullnose tool , I have only seen em used on flat edges to "polish" flet edges.
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We use signlab/engravelab/profilelab to output to all our NC machines a tekcel , multiple Isels and a small Roland , superb package for that.
I design in corel and merely export to SL which we use as a front end to our machinery. We also use it to our lasers and could probably use it to our thermal printer and our print and cut Soljet , but dont.
When we bought the tekcel , we got SL5 with all the possible modules. We use the spooler function to send to multiple machines
Im sure it will work just as well with all your stuff.
We use Corel X3 as a front end , X3 is the best UG Corel has produced and for sign and engraving guys , is a wonderful low cost solution , some really nice featrures like the new trace which outperforms many dedicated raster to vector pckages. -
Mine was a hillman imp , bought 30+ years ago (I was 16 didnt even have a liscence) for the princely sum of 5 quid (partially earned by playing father Xmas in a dept store selling lucky dips to kids " Tell your mummy she must buy you a lucky dip or Santa wont bring you a pressie" – nice job for a good jewish boy:)
It lasted for a year , my last year in school and was an amazing bird puller – but I suppose any wheels when one is 16 can pull birds. Used about 2 pints of oil a week due to a totally knackered engine and some 400 zillion oil leaks. I think the top speed was round 70 kph and if the incline was more than 2 degrees with a passenger about , one of us had to get out and push.
One day , upon coming out the cafe , I found it alight and it cost me more to have it removed than I paid for it. Remembered with fondness!!! -
I think if you change the grass/foliage to some sort of jumble of signs (arrows , stops , etc etc) and have your sign overshaddowing em (use the grey for all the other signs , yours will pop) you will have communicated exactly what you want – "Use us if you want YOURS to pop too".
I like your first design – perhaps consider a shade of green for the "foliage" – will kinda be funky and ppl will do a double take "What are those growing out the lawn???! – Oh they signs……." -
I feel Canons DPP does a better job with colours and detail , bibble seems better with noise (none of these are night and day things) Bibble has far more "correction" and other image options than DPP , but it also costs money where DPP is free.
Not sure whether Canon’s software will support Nikon files and vice versa, Currently Adobe doesnt offer support for my 30d , yet does for my 5d and DPP was basically the only program that did till I dL’ed bibble. Thats also the nice thing about shooting raw , the fact that you can convert the file at some later date with improved Raw software -
Danny
Your problem is caused by the rolls you are using , you would save yourself a lot of heartache and angst about vinyl feed if you simply changed to a supplier that can slit dead square.
Loading the roll and using the roll feed mechanism and guides are vital for good results , you can’t possibly use this effectively with compromised rolls of media.In general : Cut the edge off new rolls square by rolling the roll tight , taping the vinyl down and drawing a line from one end of the roll to the other perpendicular to the edge and cutting it on that line – you now have a square edge with respect to the roll.
Register the square edge with one of the machine strips and manually feed 2 ms thru and make any adjustments and now you have media square withboth the roll and the machine. You are almost guaranteed to get perfect results loading the roll time after time if you use the machine to cut off the graphic. The edge will still be square. Problems with end of rolls dragging the core along are always avoided if the roll isnt taped to the core, but you are not to know that , so perhaps if you know it does 3m prefeed for a 2m print , send a smaller dummy print with a determined prefeed and then send the print without. Like have a 1m , 2m , 3m standard template that will advance the material.
I have no idea whether prefeed is switched in your rip , but if it is , you can easily create a profile cutting that wont prefeed and just use it. Put a note on the machine – like "IS prefeed on or off" and you wont forget:)I still think your best strategy is to get a new supplier and use untaped square ended rolls.
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Ta for the link , will DL and try it. I also take pics in RAW and use various Raw converters and all seem to do a different job with sharpness , noise and colour rendition etc
I currently use Adobe Camera Raw with Cs2 and then tried a few others and it was a case of 6 of one and half a dozen of the other. I use Canon stuff and decided to try the camera makers software (which looked real naff) and was really wowed so now I use that and export as a 16 bit tiff to PS. Raw is soooo much better than Jpeg out the camera but the workflow is longer.
I also print on my sc540 on various media
Apart from personal enjoyment of photography , I use the pics for my customers stuff (mostly point of sale display) The prints I get are as good as I could with any commercial print lab. Up to A3 I use a really good Canon inkjet photoprinter. (we use it to do certificates too – part of the trophy bus) -
Heres how we work it
Vinyl GBP 4 per sq meter (5-7 yr stuff) + 25% wasteage = 5 pounds
Ink based on 18ml per sq meter coverage 150per litre = 3 quid
Fixed costs to operate , maintain , program , mind and pay the machine off are approx 75 quid per working day assuming you have a designer and the thing is being financed. One should do around 10 sq meters on a bad day so wack it up to 7.50 per sq meter.
Real cost per sq meter at the worst is 15.50 per sq meter and it comes down a lot if you do more than 10sq m , we work on about 11 quid real cost.Cheapest price I charge per sq meter for raw print is 30 quid on 5+ sq m , then 40 quid for less than that (with a 40 quid minimum charge) then 50 quid for large print and cut and 60 quid for smaller print and simple cut , 70 for less than 4" sq print and cut , 90 for intricate small print and cut. For an overlam on any of these we charge an extra 10 quid except for the intricate stuff that comes to 20 quid.
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How do you get to the 25 squid a sq meter? It sounds quite high to me- is that what you have worked out is your cost per sq m?
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Just one more thing , collaborative business proposals are often just a sort of industrial espionage , to find out more about a competitor or the viability of instituting a particular process or such like In such negotiations you tend to reveal a lot you would not normally do. Be Careful
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So whats in it for you?
If your co is not doing well the fillup in the workload might work out , if you are OK , then why bother with the headache a partnership is likely to cause. Treat a partnership the same way as you would a new marriage after having just gone thru a messy divorce. If you are reluctant , that should tell you all you want to know – don’t do it. -
Depending on the coverage , you can use 12-20ml per sq meter , work on an average of 15-16 ml , that is for ALL colours. IE total ink usage. Overprinting uses substantially more.
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Here’s a tip , once you have a bitmap with a removed background , corel 13 has a new function called create boundry , what this does is put a vector line around any objects you select and thus the bitmap can be printed and cut VERY easily. IE if you have a butterfly and you remove background , corel will create a die line to cut it (which you can offset etc)
Works extremely well with very complex vector graphics and so forth. Corel trace also has a remove background function if you trace bitmaps.