invizzible
New Member
I've read a few forum topics about Master cutters and I understand that not a lot of people hold this cutter in high regard. I can live with that. I'm not in love with my Master XY-380P most days but it has cut a thousand miles of vinyl and Thermo-Flex over the last three years so I'm not going to complain much. Seriously, we work the poor thing hard.
Overall, this has been a fine cutter for an entry level sign maker. I buy new pinch rollers when they blow out, I keep a sharp blad in the holder and I replace the cut protection strip as needed. So, for the most part, my cutter stays in 'like-new' condition.
Here is my problem. Over the last few weeks my cutter has been cutting rather poorly. I first noticed the problem on a Thermo-Flex logo I was cutting for one of my bigger customers. My normally stellar logo looked horrible, the straight lines of letters were curvy, cuts were incomplete and the weeding was an excercise in futility. I checked things over and all seemed to be okay to the eye. I checked my settings in SignGo, and lo and behold, I had the setting for 'plot instead of cutting' was checked. Well, duh, I said to myself, you DREW something last nite and forgot to uncheck the tab. I corrected that and recut my logo but it only looked a little better...something was still going on. Further checking and I discovered that the XY-380P driver had been replaced with a 'generic driver'. Ah, I said, that must be it, although I don't know how that happened. Installed the correct driver again but that hasn't seemed to restore my clean cuts. Now I'm left scratching my head because I don't know what other settings to check and, no surprise, the Master website has practically nothing for support. (I suppose I could call them but I have a feeling how that will go..."Hello, my name is Peggy", anybody feeling me on that one? LOL)
Just for the record, my processes have not changed for cutting. I design my work in CorelDraw X4, export my line art to an AI 4.0 file, open SignGo, import the AI file and cut. That's the way I've always done it and I've always gotten good results, whether I'm cutting small chest logos with Thermo-Flex or cutting an 8' logo for the side of a van. The only thing that's really changed is that lately my cutter seems to just be getting less precise.
If there is anybody out there who knows a little something about Master cutters or SignGo settings I'd love to hear from you. I'm fully prepared to hear things like, "You should have bought a Roland." or "You get what you pay for." or any number of other comments but I'd love it if I got some helpful answers, too! I'm very close to being able to upgrade to a nicer cutter, it's not like I'm blind to the fact that my Chinese cutter isn't top-notch. It HAS, however, been quite the performer up til now and I need help getting it back to it's glory days until I take delivery of something more professional.
Thanks for any help, I'll see you around.
Overall, this has been a fine cutter for an entry level sign maker. I buy new pinch rollers when they blow out, I keep a sharp blad in the holder and I replace the cut protection strip as needed. So, for the most part, my cutter stays in 'like-new' condition.
Here is my problem. Over the last few weeks my cutter has been cutting rather poorly. I first noticed the problem on a Thermo-Flex logo I was cutting for one of my bigger customers. My normally stellar logo looked horrible, the straight lines of letters were curvy, cuts were incomplete and the weeding was an excercise in futility. I checked things over and all seemed to be okay to the eye. I checked my settings in SignGo, and lo and behold, I had the setting for 'plot instead of cutting' was checked. Well, duh, I said to myself, you DREW something last nite and forgot to uncheck the tab. I corrected that and recut my logo but it only looked a little better...something was still going on. Further checking and I discovered that the XY-380P driver had been replaced with a 'generic driver'. Ah, I said, that must be it, although I don't know how that happened. Installed the correct driver again but that hasn't seemed to restore my clean cuts. Now I'm left scratching my head because I don't know what other settings to check and, no surprise, the Master website has practically nothing for support. (I suppose I could call them but I have a feeling how that will go..."Hello, my name is Peggy", anybody feeling me on that one? LOL)
Just for the record, my processes have not changed for cutting. I design my work in CorelDraw X4, export my line art to an AI 4.0 file, open SignGo, import the AI file and cut. That's the way I've always done it and I've always gotten good results, whether I'm cutting small chest logos with Thermo-Flex or cutting an 8' logo for the side of a van. The only thing that's really changed is that lately my cutter seems to just be getting less precise.
If there is anybody out there who knows a little something about Master cutters or SignGo settings I'd love to hear from you. I'm fully prepared to hear things like, "You should have bought a Roland." or "You get what you pay for." or any number of other comments but I'd love it if I got some helpful answers, too! I'm very close to being able to upgrade to a nicer cutter, it's not like I'm blind to the fact that my Chinese cutter isn't top-notch. It HAS, however, been quite the performer up til now and I need help getting it back to it's glory days until I take delivery of something more professional.
Thanks for any help, I'll see you around.
