Hello Signs 101 Community!
My name is Romney and I work at a sign shop / screen printing business called Majik Graphics Inc. in Clinton Township Michigan.
We have had a HP Design Jet L25500 for about a year now and have not been able to figure out how to sync our printing jobs using FLEXI 12 / Production Manager to our wonderful Graphtec FCS 5100 150.
As it stands today, we print and hand cut everything that comes off of the HP Design Jet. We have a Edge FX for our small decals but anything beyond 11.8 inches tall is a hand cutting mess. We want to use the Contour cutting features but have not been able to figure out how to successfully cut contours with any degree of accuracy. Many inches off and not to scale.
My question revolves around the strange behavior of our Graphtec or perhaps my own mistakes in production. I having been researching questions and answers and have looked over the graphtec manual extensively but have come out with poor results.
Here is my job output in Flexi 12. I'll create text that says Majik Graphics. It will be 14.50'' wide by 3.00'' tall. I will grab everything and select contour cut. It will have a offset of .150. I selected this (Green Check Mark)
I grab everything again and send the job to RIP AND PRINT.
I WILL have the contour knife blade option.
I set the registration Mark type to 1 and verify that it is also on the graphtec to accept the same format. (HP-GL Command- That one screwed me up when I was learning this)
I Print the job only - Bam everything is amazing the marks are mark length .8 thickness .020 Margin .2 total size 1 inch- Awesome!
I set the Job on the plotter, I have tired using automatic registration marks. I have had it detect them without error. I use the 3 point method.
I'll notice that the size is quite a bit off from what was printed to what it says it is detecting. I punch in the size, if it was detected at 13.53 I make it what it should have been, 14.50" or whatever it says it needs to be. Same thing for the width, it might be off a half inch.. Odd.
I'll also try putting in the axis points myself with the same results.
I go to the computer and send the job to cut... it says move knife to 1st reg. mark. it is there- send-
It will send some disgustingly over sized version.
I started using the laser method- condition 4, to see if it was on track so I stopped wasting so much material.
Everything is wayyy off. I was looking at our steps/inch resolution on the flexi plotter properties side... I don't want to make adjustments that will carry over into our regular vinyl cutting work.
I feel that I might be missing a step or overlooking something.
I will quickly respond to any questions that are needed to help answer this question that I am asking.
Thank you for any insight and help you can provide.
Romney---
My name is Romney and I work at a sign shop / screen printing business called Majik Graphics Inc. in Clinton Township Michigan.
We have had a HP Design Jet L25500 for about a year now and have not been able to figure out how to sync our printing jobs using FLEXI 12 / Production Manager to our wonderful Graphtec FCS 5100 150.
As it stands today, we print and hand cut everything that comes off of the HP Design Jet. We have a Edge FX for our small decals but anything beyond 11.8 inches tall is a hand cutting mess. We want to use the Contour cutting features but have not been able to figure out how to successfully cut contours with any degree of accuracy. Many inches off and not to scale.
My question revolves around the strange behavior of our Graphtec or perhaps my own mistakes in production. I having been researching questions and answers and have looked over the graphtec manual extensively but have come out with poor results.
Here is my job output in Flexi 12. I'll create text that says Majik Graphics. It will be 14.50'' wide by 3.00'' tall. I will grab everything and select contour cut. It will have a offset of .150. I selected this (Green Check Mark)
I grab everything again and send the job to RIP AND PRINT.
I WILL have the contour knife blade option.
I set the registration Mark type to 1 and verify that it is also on the graphtec to accept the same format. (HP-GL Command- That one screwed me up when I was learning this)
I Print the job only - Bam everything is amazing the marks are mark length .8 thickness .020 Margin .2 total size 1 inch- Awesome!
I set the Job on the plotter, I have tired using automatic registration marks. I have had it detect them without error. I use the 3 point method.
I'll notice that the size is quite a bit off from what was printed to what it says it is detecting. I punch in the size, if it was detected at 13.53 I make it what it should have been, 14.50" or whatever it says it needs to be. Same thing for the width, it might be off a half inch.. Odd.
I'll also try putting in the axis points myself with the same results.
I go to the computer and send the job to cut... it says move knife to 1st reg. mark. it is there- send-
It will send some disgustingly over sized version.
I started using the laser method- condition 4, to see if it was on track so I stopped wasting so much material.
Everything is wayyy off. I was looking at our steps/inch resolution on the flexi plotter properties side... I don't want to make adjustments that will carry over into our regular vinyl cutting work.
I feel that I might be missing a step or overlooking something.
I will quickly respond to any questions that are needed to help answer this question that I am asking.
Thank you for any insight and help you can provide.
Romney---
