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Old 10-25-2018, 11:15 PM
amoscarmel amoscarmel is offline
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Advice on laser paper cutter (ya, another one...)

I am a novice as electronics and computer hardware or gadgets etc are concerned, so here are some questions about laser paper cutters:
1) Can this machine trace an already printed paper with the airplane parts on it?
2) Does this procedure involve software (obviously) with the desired parts to be cut at the same time?
3) any recommendations on a brand or a machine? My budget is $300 plus/minus $50

Please help
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  #2  
Old 10-26-2018, 05:01 AM
Gene K Gene K is offline
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Quote:
Originally Posted by amoscarmel View Post
1) Can this machine trace an already printed paper with the airplane parts on it?
Yes, most cutters come with software that allows tracing and cutting. However, based on my experience with Silhouette software, the trace feature is not fine enough for paper model pattern tracing.

Most cutters' software have a "Print and Cut" capability -- in short, prints registration marks on a scanned graphic that the cutter then uses to cut around the graphic. Pretty good, but again, not precise enough for paper modeling.

Quote:
2) Does this procedure involve software (obviously) with the desired parts to be cut at the same time?
Not at all sure what you're asking, but yes, the cutter software definitely requires a commitment to going to school. Preparing the graphic may require an outside program like Paint Shop Pro or Inkscape to clean up the graphic of extraneous lines, part numbers, etc. (lines that you don't want cut). Requires quite a bit of computer effort.

Quote:
3) any recommendations on a brand or a machine? My budget is $300 plus/minus $50
That's more than enough. As for recommendation, I have a couple of Silhouettes (Portrait and Curio) that use the same software -- good machines, but frankly, not worth the significant effort to use them to cut paper model parts. There's no free lunch.

Gene K
(I use my Curio to cut thick, "simple" parts like ribs and formers -- that I've manually vector traced using Inkscape before importing into the Silhouette software. That works GREAT!).
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Old 10-26-2018, 06:12 AM
amoscarmel amoscarmel is offline
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Thank you so much Gene, I'll have to reconsider this venture. If anyone else has more light to shed on this, please do.
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Old 10-26-2018, 11:36 AM
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a380 a380 is offline
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i may be able to help a little. i have an emblaser 1 laser cutter that cost $750 several years ago. It's an amazing device but cannot cut pre-printed designs. i posted an initial review and the discussion that followed may be useful to you.

emblaser laser cutter

currently, as far as i know, there is an emblaser 2 on the market and the glowforge on the way, that have indexing cameras that may allow cutting of pre-printed parts.

https://glowforge.com

https://darklylabs.com

hope this helps.
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