Alternative material to vinyl? (for cutting)

[Garrett Nors]

I haven't really looked into it very much but I have people come in at least a few times a week asking if we make vinyl stickers for windows or whatever else they'd use it for. I tell them we can't and they go about their business.

Is there a material that is durable enough to be a replacement to vinyl that's safe for me to cut?

I know with proper ventilation and quick passes I can cut vinyl but it makes me uneasy and I don't want to have any warranty issues.

[Gary Hair]

You can cut polyester instead. There are fewer choices of color but you may find enough to do what you want. Another option would be to buy either a used vinly cutter or an inexpensive new one. I have one that I bought primarily for cutting sandblast mask but have cut a fair amount of vinyl as well.

Gary

[Garrett Nors]

Any recommendations? I don't know anything about the cutter/plotter industry...what are some reputable brands? Good starter size? How thick of a material would I mostly be cutting if it were just for window stickers and maybe a few other oddball things?

[Larry Bratton]

Garrett:
Engineering grade reflective is either acrylic or polyester. I cut it in my laser all the time. Reflective would make kewl stickers.
I once made a skeleton for Halloween by putting white reflective on acrylic, cut out the various shapes for arms, legs, torso etc, lasered holes in the parts and wired it all together. That thing was awesome when car lights hit it hanging from a tree!

[Garrett Nors]

Sounds interesting! Where do you get your supplies?

[Larry Bratton]

Sounds interesting! Where do you get your supplies?
I use Tape Technology's material http://www.tapetechnologies.com/reflective.html
I buy mine locally but they probably have a distributor in your area, call and ask them. Reflective is kinda pricey but it works well and won't harm your machine.

[Joe Pelonio]

Laserlites will also work for stickers, laserbits and most Rowmark dealers have it. I used it for a bunch of hardhats with a logo and name.

Sign supplies have the reflective but also mirror poly in gold and silver, and both in brushed.

[Jani Pedersen]

Ooh this is interesting, I was under the impression that ALL sign vinyl etc was a no no due to the gasses they release.

I have a gerber printer and cutter as well as a cutter plotter but I'd be very interested in being able to use reflective material in the engraver.

I wish I could find some luminous acrylic that can be used in it, I've found some reflective, but was disappointed to find out that the luminous couldn't be used.

With regards to what are 'good' cutters I'd say that there are two things you should consider, your finances and whether or not you will need to line things up in the future when you are using the cutter.

If you think that at some point you might like to print onto say trasnfer paper and then put it into the cutter to vector cut the design out, then I would say it would be well worth investing in a machine which has an 'optical eye'.

What that means is that you are able to put a registration mark onto the paper prior to printing it from the same program as you would use to send it to the cutter. When it is then placed in the cutter and the job is sent to it, the blade will move to the registration mark first and 'get its bearings' so to speak, so that it knows where to cut around. You can buy a cheaper optical eye cutter from Craft robo, they have a few sizes available. More expensive makes are the Roland ranges. Mimaki and Graphtec etc.

Alternatively if you are wanting to keep your finances for the engraving side of the business and only want to spend a bit on a cutter then I'd say don't be too shy of going for the cheaper ones. The most important thing to ensure you get is back up support, someone on the end of the phone to give advice if you have teething problems as you learn how to use it. I have a vinyl printer and cutter I paid £6,000 for second hand, and I have a chinese cutter I paid £400 for, I've had them both a good while now and no issues with either.

I'm going to have to phone identify tomorrow now and find out about the use of reflective vinly in the epilog.

[Rodne Gold]

You can use a desktop printer to print on polyester based inkjet vinyl and then die cut it in the laser , for full colour print/cut type decals..

[Jeremy Butler]

How much do you have to spend? I dont have very much so I just bought a little cheap one for right now and Ive made 4 times as much with that than my laser and its a lot less work for me, I just bought the US Cutter MH 871 30" cutter for around 300 on ebay, it works fine for me and the first job paid for it now I have another toy to play with :) it came with a program but I dont like it so I still design everything in corel, export it as EPS, import into the other program and print, not much else to really learn, hope it helps

[Dave West]

Same here. I tried to cut a sticker out of sign vinyl. Aside from the posionous and corrosive gases, the edge quality was a bit jagged. I bought an inexpensive Chinese vinyl cutter (Refine 721) and never looked back. I now have another product to offer.

Dave

[Larry Bratton]

Admittedly a plotter works well for cutting vinyl. I hate using application tape and messing with it, so I use reflective to make signs for various applications. I normally take the substrate, acrylic, aluminum and even PVC sheet and cover the whole piece with reflective. (Be sure and use the wet method and do not squegee), then kiss cut the reflective at about 10 or 12 power and weed away the excess. Then squegee it down and your done.
Here is an example

[Richard Rumancik]

Larry - what is the reason for the wet method? Are you just trying to get minimal adhesion so weeding is better?

Sign looks good - but someone stole the phone!

[Larry Bratton]

Larry - what is the reason for the wet method? Are you just trying to get minimal adhesion so weeding is better?

Sign looks good - but someone stole the phone!
Yes Richard. The adhesive on the reflective is very aggressive. If you put it down wet and just lightly sqeegee you can weed it easily off the substrate otherwise it's difficult to remove it.

Hahaha..yes they did (or we put up the sign before the phone arrived :))