Laser Cut Software

[Brian Robison]

I have posted in another place so......
Does anyone know how to pick text or artwork and put it in a specific spot
on the page? Seems like a simple basic necessary task for any drawing program
to me yet I don't see how to do it.
It allows you to center to the page easily but to move to an X & Y spot??????

[Pete James]

First, I would advise using LaserCut as little as possible for actually creating the artwork. We use a product called Serif which I believe is still only $99 most people use CorelDraw. You can select text or objects in LaserCut and drag and drop (a little cross with 4 points will appear at the center of the group just grab it with your mouse and move) or move via the arrow keys.

[John Bion]

Brian,
I agree with Pete, don't bother with Lasercut, use another program to design/draw (CorelDraw/ Serif / Draftsight - this is free, just google it). When you have done your drawing, save as an Autocad 2000 DXF file and Import into Lasercut. Occasionally you may need to use the Unite Lines function in Lasercut. When doing text in CorelDraw, change the text to Curves (Arrange Tab) before saving as a DXF - Lasercut does not handle text well.
Lasercut is a pet dislike of mine! As Pete said, you can then select the entire image and drag and drop it on your bed wherever you want in lasercut.
Regards, John

[Dave Sheldrake]

Font2DXF is excellent and provides outlines of any installed font and supplies them as polylines saved as DXF by default.

A pet dislike is "Unite Lines" it's a coverup function for bad drawing practices ;) The difference between a good drawing and a bad one can be 20 minutes run time on a 1 hour job. I've seen a lot of bad drawings that have been sent in but one guy who IS very good is Paul Campbell at MakeCNC, his drawings are all polys and have almost no errors as well as being in a laser ready format.(and cheap)

Lemme see if I can get a few demo's run up and posted to provide examples.

cheers

Dave

[John Bion]

A pet dislike is "Unite Lines" it's a coverup function for bad drawing practices ;) The difference between a good drawing and a bad one can be 20 minutes run time on a 1 hour job.
cheers
Dave

I bow my head in shame Dave....:( You are correct though! However when I first started it was useful occasionally:o and may be to another new user (especially of CorelDraw - which is not your favourite drawing program). Thanks for tip on Font2DXF.

Kind Regards,
John

[Brian Robison]

Corel is not a problem, been using it for 10 years, Auto Cad, 15.
The issue I have is exact placement of art work.

[John Bion]

The issue I have is exact placement of art work.

Hi Brian,
What machine do you have - clearly we are not talking about your Epilog. Lasercut's only use, as far as I am concerned is rather like a bureaucrat's office you have to visit in order to get permission to use your own initiative :) . Other than that I would leave it alone. (In fact the sooner someone finds a way of defunding the bureaucrat and replace it with a sleek market driven piece of software - the better)
As far as I understand, there is no way to precisely place the artwork in Lasercut; due to the use of steppers not servos, Lasercut does not know exactly where the head is and therefore you are unable to simply type in X/Y co-ords - which is what I originally anticipated doing.

I do quite a bit of reverse side engraving so this was an issue I faced. The following is all rather 'mechanical' but functions for me - others can chime in with better systems they use.
I have got around this by simply importing and dragging the artwork to roughly the correct position in Lasercut and then jiggling the physical board or article to place it precisely utilising the red dot pointer (as long as it is accurately focussed) or a 'test fire' from the laser. I use either jigs or a system of cutting 'marker holes' in the board corners in order to aid me in getting the reverse done accurately. A 'test run' with the red dot is useful to ensure alignment once you have the position spot on. None of this takes too long.
Hope that has helped. Regards, John

[Rich Harman]

due to the use of steppers not servos, Lasercut does not know exactly where the head is and therefore you are unable to simply type in X/Y co-ords - which is what I originally anticipated doing.

Choice of motors has nothing to do with it. My laser, which uses steppers, knows *exactly* where the head is at all times. Although I never use the feature, you can perform all work relative to the machine origin.

Also, in LaserWorks you can specify the X/Y coordinates of an object by selecting it and then typing in the values at the upper left hand corner of the screen. You can also specify the X/Y coordinates for the head to move to. Maybe LaserCut is different in this regard.

[Mike Lysov]

As far as I understand, there is no way to precisely place the artwork in Lasercut; due to the use of steppers not servos, Lasercut does not know exactly where the head is and therefore you are unable to simply type in X/Y co-ords - which is what I originally anticipated doing.

That's strange. I do not think we are talking about moving a laser head manually which is a problem with stepping motors. However why so simple function as setting artwork at the specific point of a laser bed is missing in LaserCut is a big question. I am running a laser with stepping motors as well and it comes with its own job control software. I have a few interesting features like lead in/out missing in my laser software and it has very primitive functionality but at least I can set a job anywhere I want with .001mm accuracy by entering its x/y coordinates.

[Dave Sheldrake]

The communication with the steppers in lasercut is one way.

cheers

Dave

[Brian Robison]

I have a Rabbit 1290.
So if I used the Corel plug in, would that solve my issue?

[John Bion]

Hi Brian,
It seems to me that Rabbit have really good support in the US, why not contact them direct.
I have seen mixed reactions to the Corel plug in, it seems to work for some and not at all for others. I was initially told it would run fine with my X6 - it does not, so I purchased X3 ("definitely" works with that)- it still does not. Hopefully you will be lucky with 12. I would be interested to hear if it does. Lasercut is the biggest let down on our machines:eek: Aside from that they are great for the price/purpose.
Regards, John

[Brian Robison]

I will contact Ray, but I know he was going on vacation so I wanted to leave him alone.

[Vicki Rivrud]

Hi Brian,
I think you explained this very well. Lasercut is a type of print driver, with some capability to continue to tweak your drawing, to download to the controller board.

IMHO and all due respect to everyone, we have to remember that a Chinese laser and Lasercut is Neither the exact equivalent of a US branded laser and its print driver nor is the pricing. So there are many differences that we have to learn to work around if one has actually used a high dollar system or feel or experience the Chinese short comings in marketing similar equipment and software.

Now with that said, after working with my Chinese laser and Lasercut, I can place my artwork dead on wherever I need to, by using the grid screen in Lasercut using the immediate function or manually placing my laser head manual were I want to, using the red dot and the test function. We have also placed grid marks on our laser perimeter.

When in doubt I do a cardboard test before hitting the actual intended substrate if my need is that critical or precise.

We do everything from precision cutting R/C Airplane kits and parts to engraving personalized items such as pens or pretty much anything anyone brings us.

When cutting an entire sheet of plywood we move the head all the way over to the top left hand side of the bed and that in essence is 0,0 - with the same position in Lasercut the sheet is cut precisely.

When I want to work in the dead center of the bed, I can use ctrl Y in Lasercut and it is exactly in the middle - so I can place my jig or item exactly in the center of the bed - again using the immediate function the head goes exactly to dead center and my artwork is exactly where I want it.

I have yet to find a feature or function in the syscfg file that would allow me to input co-ordinates. I have spoken with Andy at Leetro and he says the same.

For the money I paid, I love my Chinese laser and learn something new everyday, even after all these years of using it.

Happy lasering,
Vicki

[Roy Nielsen]

Brian,

I am very pleased using the LaserCut plugin with CorelDraw 12 and positioning within CDR. I have not used LaserCut directly other than once or twice when I was first getting started just to test things. I do occasionally get a lockup after clicking on the LaserCut button, requiring me to close and reopen CDR, but other than that, which takes under a minute to close/restart/reopen file, I've had no problems. Repeatability is very good; I was cutting a project last weekend and apparently had some troublesome BB that had several spots that didn't cut through the first time. After pulling the ply out and removing those pieces that cut fine, I put it back in my machine, re-homed, and re-ran the job which was almost perfectly spot-on the original cut lines; any amount off was certainly from removing/reinserting the plywood. (I have found that it is important to re-home frequently, especially if I've manually stopped a job which often results in the head being a bit "lost".)

What I haven't been able to figure out is how to start a job from the laser head's current position when using CDR. When I change the setting that should allow that, the job always starts at the same point X+/Y- of bed center, regardless of head position. Thus, I've gotten pretty good at measuring to optimize remaining material space.

Roy

[Allen Rawley]

Hello,

To utilize LaserCut to place a raster engrave or vector cut part in a specific position on the table, you can do the following steps:
1. Open Lasercut
2. Draw a rectangle that is roughly the size of the working area of your table (many tables have a specification of a working area that is slightly larger than the exact working area as set by the X and Y limits switches used in homing. So, if your table is 1200 x 900, it may be 1150 x 890 or the like.
3. Set the origin to the back left corner of your machine.
4. In your parameters section (where you set to cut and the laser speed and power, etc., uncheck the output box (assuming you use Lasercut 5.3)
5. Then, place your artwork for engraving and cutting in the position that you would like on your machine and it will be processed there.

I cannot remember if this is the case, but I believe that the Lasercut 5.3 is unable to do a bounding box around only the artwork that is checked as output. If this is the case, then the bounding box will cause the laser focus assembly to travel around the entire machine table, rather than your positioned artwork.