Cutting Circles

[Kyle7419]

For those of you who have worked with cardstock before what is a good method for cutting circles in 110 lbs. Cardstock? Is there a cutting device any one would recommend? Or do most of you think free hand is best?
Any help would be greatly appreciated!

[sreinmann]

Kind of depends on the size you’re going for Kyle. I have a craft circle cutter for radiuses larger than 2cm. And a hole punch set for diameters smaller than 2mm. A couple caveats on those. The former takes a couple of passes to cut clean through, and you get good at finding the centers of things, which aren’t often provided. The latter requires some practice to center over the part or the hole. I’m not good at it. For all sizes in between I use a combination of a new #10 exacto blade and a curved scalpel blade. Again multiple passes to get a clean cut and the a bit of edge trimming as needed. https://www.amazon.com/dp/B07FDRCXVM..._D1BPFbN3QMFQ9

[Burning Beard]

I use a book punch for the small circles, but for the bigger ones I just cut them by hand. I have tried circle cutters but found them clumsy and not as accurate as hand cutting.

[Paper Kosmonaut]

For all small circles, I think hole punches are your friend. I have them from 2mm to 15mm, the latter hardly used while you really have to push and twist the hole punch with mixed results. a Hammer is perhaps convenient to get the circle loose in one whack. For bigger stuff up to 3, 4 cm, I often use the old eyeball and hand cutting method. I have a pair of nail cutting scissors, with curved blades, they are nice for keeping the curvature.

For everything bigger than 4cm I often use a circle cutter exactly like this one. This one is great because it leaves no hole in the center when cutting - and you get a transparent guidance aide with it to help you place the cutter. You can also remove the 'foot' and have an actual pointy bit that goes into the paper you're cutting if you need that center point for later use.

[cardist]

Hi Kyle,

As previously mentioned, it depends upon the size of circle. For small sizes I use cut-down hypodermic canulae, but you need some fine wire to poke the card build up from the needle. For larger circles, I use an NT Circle cutter. This is a very stable and accurate beam cutter and is available from Amazon. A link to how I use it is here.

BPM Stielhandgrenate

All the best and happy modelling

[Damraska]

Like Burning Beard, I use hole punches when possible but otherwise cut by hand.

To date, I have found three useful hand held, single hole punches, the standard size used for documents, a 1/4 inch punch for scrapbooking, and a 1/8th inch punch for scrapbooking. Cheap punches with poor cutting surfaces tend to break quickly or make poor circles. A trick--when punching out a circle, place an extra sheet of paper beneath the part. The bottom circle cut from the extra piece of paper will tend to suffer any punch problems while the upper sheet delivers a clean circle.

Micro Mark sells an elaborate die and punch set for producing tiny circles but it costs $60 US. Some of my acquaintances in the International Society of Plastic Modelers (IPMS) use that set with excellent results but I have yet to acquire one. :o If you go looking for a cheaper set, make sure to read all the reviews! For example, Harbor Freight sells a similar punch and die for half the price but half the reviewers report alignment problems, dull punches, and cracked acrylic faces.

My brother owns a machine that cuts out entire pages of parts automatically, including circles! It uses a very small cutting blade mounted on a moving head, sort of like the print head found inside an inkjet printer. A thin, slightly sticky cutting mat holds the card stock for cutting. The machine cuts based on a digital line drawing, producing a whole page of perfectly cut parts in minutes! I have no idea what it is called, how much it costs, how long it lasts, how well it aligns printed page to file, or how it handles tiny parts, but based on the demonstration I saw, it can cut very elaborate patterns.

Finally, some of the ladies I know use a Fiskars Circle Cutter for scrapbooking and report good results. Again, I have not used that cutter for myself.

Edit: The NY Cutter mentioned above looks rather superior to the Fiskars Circle Cutter. I may need to order myself one of those...

[jaffro]

I've always been a believer in trying new things, I've spent a lot of money on various circle cutters from the cheap compass type, to the expensive shadow hobby circle cutter and I have a Brother Scan n Cut machine.

At the end of the day, I still prefer to cut by hand, a quarter of a circle at a time, then rotating the part. With thicker card it's better to sometimes do multiple passes until you get through, without using too much pressure.

[whulsey]

For the smaller circles, I have a couple of sets of hole punches that I bought at Tandy Leather. Being made for leatherwork they are a better quality then the Harbor Freight ones. Larger I do by hand. Haven't found any of the circle cutters that work well for me at least until you get over an inch and by that point I usually use some small scissors. I find the Honey Bee brand in the scrapbooking section work well.

[asettico]

Originally Posted by Paper Kosmonaut

For everything bigger than 4cm I often use a circle cutter exactly like this one. This one is great because it leaves no hole in the center when cutting - and you get a transparent guidance aide with it to help you place the cutter. You can also remove the 'foot' and have an actual pointy bit that goes into the paper you're cutting if you need that center point for later use.

I saw that there is also a transparent version, it could be easier to align it over the model. I'm thinking to get one, but I would like to know if somebody tested it and if the strength is comparable to the white model, especially if you want to mod it.

[Wyvern]

Curved cuticle scissors (the health and beauty section of just about any store) can be useful for making short curved cuts, as in detail trimming.

Wyvern