Being square, engraver to shear - Engraving Etc. Forum

From:	Chris (VINYLDESIGNS)	17 May 2006
To:	ALL	1 of 10

3861.1

I'm a newb so bare with me....

The problem I'm having is when I place my trophy brass on the engraver, engrave a series of plates, and then take to the shear to cut apart there is always a little bit of crookedness about the whole thing.

In a nutshell I'm having hell getting my material placed square on my engraver (EGX-30). Are there any tricks that may help me along ? I have been trying to use a piece of 1" keystock and lay it on the outside of the engraver table and then butt up the brass to the keystock. I figured this would make the brass square to the table, obviously not. Either that or my square (New AccuCutter) is just a hair out of adjustment, although all the squares I have at the shop show it to be dead nuts.

Thanks for listening,
Chris

EDITED: 18 May 2006 by DGL

From:	rekey	17 May 2006
To:	Chris (VINYLDESIGNS)	2 of 10

3861.2 In reply to 3861.1
Have you verified that the laser beam is square to your table? On my Epilog, it wasn't perfect from the factory and had to be adjusted. Try putting tape along the rulers, vector straight lines and check the squreness. On my machine I can move the rulers via set screws and square them to the lines.

From:	JHayes55	18 May 2006
To:	Chris (VINYLDESIGNS)	5 of 10

3861.5 In reply to 3861.1
Logo John has the simplest & quickest fix. If I am correct the Roland EGX-30 is a flat bed engraver and you simply lay the material to be engraved to the edges - in other words you have no fence to square up to. Correct? Did the EGX - 30 come with a metal bed or a hard plastic type bed? Depending on your answer there maybe another solution. Let me know. Joe

From:	Zonas	18 May 2006
To:	Chris (VINYLDESIGNS)	6 of 10

3861.6 In reply to 3861.1

It could be your shear. I recently purchased (at ARA Show) an Accu-Cutter shear. Steve has been working with them because it was not cutting square. As a matter of fact I have 2 blades to return to them today. With some of the blades there was as much as .030 difference between the start and end of a 12" piece of 1/16" plastic. So I recommend you check your shear closely, first make sure you have the proper blade for what you are cutting, then do some testing on scrap material. You haven't mentioned if this is a new shear or not, (a dull blade will also 'pull' your material) if new you might want to talk to your supplier about your problem as the blade might not have been made properly. I have also clamped a 12" squaring frame to my shear so I can immediately see if a previous cut has gotten off. Most of the cuts get 'off' in the last third of the shear (the last part cut), which is why it shows up more when cutting full sheets instead of small pieces.

Zona

From:	Chris (VINYLDESIGNS)	18 May 2006
To:	ALL	7 of 10

3861.7

I have put boxes around each plate to try to help. Just cant seem to eyeball it good enough to cut right on the line.

I will do some more checking as far as the straightness of my shear, which as I mentioned is new.

Thanks for the replies,
Chris

From:	bruce (BBSD)	18 May 2006
To:	ALL	8 of 10

3861.8 In reply to 3861.7

our shear tends to push the metal sheet stock back even though it is square.

When we do a matrix of plates,we want a down cut on all 4 sides, so we put cut lines on all sides. We cut down between 2 cut lines to get a more managable size.

We then offset the cutline toward the ruler slightly off the shear to compesate. All by eye and feel.

Sometimes we clamp a square to length, not allowing the matal to be pushe back.

Bruce

From:	Harvey only (HARVEY-ONLY)	18 May 2006
To:	bruce (BBSD)	9 of 10

3861.9 In reply to 3861.8

There are a few problems with a shear. And solutions.

Click on 'Harvey's Tips Page' at the bottom of this post and read the blurb on shears. I think it is the third one down.

Philadelphia, PA (Really Bensalem)

Harvey's Tips Page When you finally understand it completely... it changes.

EDITED: 18 May 2006 by HARVEY-ONLY

From:	logojohn	18 May 2006
To:	Chris (VINYLDESIGNS)	10 of 10

3861.10 In reply to 3861.7
I have recommended a small quillotine shear in the past for cutting plates that have a cut out box engraved. The blade is across the top and the handle to the right. You have to be careful since there is no guard. But this makes it very easy to look down from above over the blade. You can see the cut lines easily and get a straight cut. We use a space between plates and cut the line completely off. If you try to cut down the middle you will get a line left on one side or another. This is not critical for trophy plates but for plates going on gift items it is unacceptable. It is really best to also have a regular type shear for pre cutting larger size blanks. There is only about a 9" table on the guillotine so cutting 12x24 sheets to size is a challenge. We have an old conventional shear that is no longer made that has a 12 inch blade but the table is over 18 inches long. That is used for cutting large plates without guidelines. It even has rubber stops that come down with the blade to stop movement. It was made by Awardsmith. I wish they still made it since ours is about worn out. Does anyone have the 19" accucutter guilotine? How long a table does it have? That might have to be the replacement. Here is more detail about the small guillotine. http://www.engravingetc.org/forum/index.php?webtag=EE&msg=1145.13 .