Trotec Training

[Scott Shepherd]

Seems like there's a lot of new Trotec owners out there these days. Here's a clip I did to help explain a common problem you'll most certainly see.

This is a rather long video, but hopefully it explains something that helps someone out there. I'm very sorry for the length of it, but it covers things that need to be seen and explained. There's a LOT more to this than this one video so I'll work on going into more detail once I get some feedback on whether or not this helped anyone.

Once it starts playing, click on the gear in the youtube control panel and change it to HD. It should be recorded at pretty high quality and it best viewed in HD.

Any questions, just ask and I'm sure someone here can answer it!


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=b4tpdCgkpAw

[Mike Null]

Steve

Well done! First time I've seen hd full screen on you tube.

What did you use for the screen capture?

[Scott Shepherd]

Thanks Mike! Hopefully it'll help someone, or someone will show me something that I had missed.

I'm using QuickTime on my Mac to capture it. It's such an awesome screen capturing tool and it's included in the Mac software. The only issue is that this computer isn't connected to the laser, so I can't demonstrate some of the things I'd like to with the machine connected. I'll either get something to capture that on the PC that runs the machine or I'll drag this thing into the laser room and hook it up at some point.

After I finished that and watched it back, I couldn't help but think that I missed so much stuff that needed to be covered. So many videos are cut into 5 minutes or 8 minutes or so and I can't see how to explain any of this in 5 minutes. It's all tied together and needs to be explained together. I need to make part 2 and 3 just on this one topic soon to tie it all in.

[Tony saunders]

Cool video Scott ... very useful and thanks for taking the time to make and post it :)

[Bob A Miller]

Thanks Steve.... Just got my training & setup today & watching it in advance helped a lot.

A bit of a challenge unlearning the Gwieke process given I used black for cutting & red for engraving.

Bob

[Don Corbeil]

Thanks Steve, I look forward to going through this again once my speedy 300 is delivered in a couple of weeks.
A quick review of this sort of reminds me of some of the issues I ran into in formatting autoCAD print jobs. Jobs had to be set up precisely to get the project printed in the correct location on a chosen medium. We didn't want to have to run a job twice on expensive sheets of mylar. This will be even more true with engraving...

[donald bugansky]

Nice work Steve!

[Scott Shepherd]

You're welcome guys. I have more coming, so keep coming back to this thread. I've got the follow up of this one coming which will explain more about why some of it works the way it does.

One thing people can often overlook is the reasons things are as they are. It's easy to say "That's not how it should work", only to find out it works that way for a very powerful reason, a reason that gives you a lot of options and control of things that you normally don't have. I'm no master at Job Control X by any means, and believe me, I still learn things all the time. About 2 weeks ago, something hit me and the light bulb finally came on, and it totally changed how I used and viewed some things in there. So it's still very much a learning process for me as well. I think I started using JCX in October of 2012. We were beta testing it at the time so I wasn't able to talk about it, but hopefully I've learned something in that time period that can keep others from having to learn things the slow way.

[Mike Lysov]

Have you checked that you do not have some margins set up for a page in either Corel or Trotec Print driver?
It may be the reason why jobs with exact Trotec table sizes are bigger and do not fit in Job Control.

[Scott Shepherd]

Have you checked that you do not have some margins set up for a page in either Corel or Trotec Print driver?
It may be the reason why jobs with exact Trotec table sizes are bigger and do not fit in Job Control.

Yes, it's just a glitch that's been there from the beginning. Not just me and my setup. The fact that a .001" change makes the difference gives me the idea that the core program is all written in metric and converted over to Standard for the USA market and it's probably a rounding issue in the conversion behind the scenes that's making the .001" make a difference. That's my educated guess.

[Mike Null]

For what it's worth, I concur with Steve.

[Scott Shepherd]

I've got another video uploading at the moment. Not my finest work, but hopefully it'll add to what we discussed in the last video. I'll post it here as soon as it finishes uploading. This time around was filled with computer related glitches during it all, like my mouse buttons not working right, shift keys not working, etc. Sorry about all of that. I have to plug in a mouse with a scroll wheel to make Corel work right on my Mac and it's just not something I use at all, so no matter what I do, it's wrong the first time :) (oh, and the second time too).

[Scott Shepherd]

Okay folks, here's part 2 of this one. Plenty more videos to come, so check this thread from time to time to see new stuff. We've only just started, so there's a lot to cover in the months to come.

Just like the last one, once you start the video, click the gear, then pick the HD option and it should be good and clear. Very sorry in advance for all the little odd things, like it not picking my laser when it's the default printer, etc. That's the pitfall of doing this through parallels, not on a native Windows PC. But I really like the screen capturing on the Mac, so forgive the little odd things that make me look stupid :)


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6gbzbobLhdE

[Robert Tepper]

I create my page as 28.6 x 17". I have a Rayjet 300 and do not have job control, but I have never run into a problem using these dimensions.

Robert

[Scott Shepherd]

You can really use what works best for you. For us, we cut a pretty fair amount of acrylic that comes in 4' x 8' sheets. So we put it on the CNC router and cut it down the middle and then into 17" tall pieces. So we end up with 24" x 17" +/- 1/16" a lot of the times, which means we use 24" x 17" as our standard page size in CorelDraw.

I mentioned it in the video, there are many ways to do the same thing and what works for one person might be different for someone else. There's no "One Size Fits All", I can only show what I know and do and why I did it. It might be something you don't use at all, or you might be doing things that I'm not even aware of.

[Brian J Rogalny]

Nice job Steve, never thought about setting up like that.

[Tony saunders]

… stop fighting it and change to the metric system guys!…. you have 10 fingers and toes (unless you have worked in a wood mill :D)

I still go into some shops here and have guys telling me that I need to use some Whitworth or other thread size from the 1800's … and I suffered nothing but verbal abuse when I visited Tormach and had the temerity to mention a millimetre … thought I was going to be hung !!

go metric - it's easy peasy lemon squeezy :D :p LOL

[Mike Null]

Steve

Another well done!

That will save me some time on every job for two of my customers who repeat like orders monthly.

[Scott Shepherd]

Thanks Mike! I'm really glad to see it helped you! There's just so much power in the Trotec Job Control system. Power that I think most people don't even know exists. My guess is most people running them are just doing things the same way every time because it's all the know. Hopefully through these videos we can expand the knowledge and get a lot of people using a lot more features, which makes us all move forward. If our "Superuser" group gets larger and larger, then we can give better feedback and feature requests that will help all of us.

[Scott Shepherd]

Are these clips helpful to many? If so, I'll do some more. If not that's okay too. Looks like they are being viewed a fair amount but not much feedback so far.

If anyone has anything specific they want done, let me know and I'll see if I can accomplish that.

[Tony Lenkic]

Scott,

I have viewed clips and you have done great job so far. You are correct in saying that most operators use same steps on most jobs because they are used certain steps and it works for them.
Your tip on "POSITION JOB MULTIPLE" is one I can use in many setups I run. No need to do multiple plates in Corel or Xenetech if data is same on all of them.

One thing I would like to see is how do you setup machine to engrave bitmap images (pictures and bitmap logos ).

Thank you for clips and the effort you put in producing them. I look forward to more of the same.

BTW, do you print form XGW to Trotec laser?

[Mike Null]

Steve

You're the spittin' image of Festus.

[Greg W Watson]

I wish I had seen this prior to banging my head against the wall last year figuring it out on my own :)

[Mike Null]

Wouldn't have helped. It wasn't posted until March of this year.

[John Warren]

Are these clips helpful to many? If so, I'll do some more. If not that's okay too. Looks like they are being viewed a fair amount but not much feedback so far.

If anyone has anything specific they want done, let me know and I'll see if I can accomplish that.

They were helpful for me to watch. I don't have a laser yet, but am looking to buy a Trotec towards the end of the month. It's hard for me to know specifically what to ask for you to cover since I haven't had a chance to dig into the software myself yet.

[shawn m reed]

I've got another video uploading at the moment. Not my finest work, but hopefully it'll add to what we discussed in the last video. I'll post it here as soon as it finishes uploading. This time around was filled with computer related glitches during it all, like my mouse buttons not working right, shift keys not working, etc. Sorry about all of that. I have to plug in a mouse with a scroll wheel to make Corel work right on my Mac and it's just not something I use at all, so no matter what I do, it's wrong the first time :) (oh, and the second time too).

Steve...just got my Speedy 400 a couple weeks ago, and it's in the shop with exhaust finally hooked up, and I'm watching your videos. As you mentioned Parallels, I just wanted to see if you'd had any issues with running all of the Trotec software (jobcontrol & coreldraw) in parallels....I've got a mac pro (it's a few years old, but has 48gb of ram and a 2.66 quad-core xeon processor, so I'm pretty sure it can handle the processing power). I'd prefer not to pick up another computer just to run the laser, but my rep said I'd have problems running everything in parallels.

Thanks a lot for your videos...they're doing a lot to give me an idea of how things work and what I want to ask my rep before he shows up for training.

[Mick A Martin]

GREAT video Scott ... very useful and thanks for taking the time to make and post it I can at least cut something now.

Could I ask for a request .... could you explain about cutting 3D, I understand how to create a 8 bit image. but how do you load it into Job Control X?

[Tamsyn Michael]

Thanks a lot Scott - just downloading the video now. We have the same laser, and a lot of issues, so fingers cross it helps.

[john passek]

I hope you continue to ad more videos, I have learned more from the first two than I did on my training day. it's hard to find good quality training videos that go into detail of how to do certain things.
Thanks for all the time you spent putting them online.
John

[Mayo Pardo]

I appreciate the videos Steve - seeing how other people set up work flow can save a lot of time if we're doing things in a less efficient way. Saving a job file with just one piece compared to saving multiple jobs with various quantities of the same piece can save a bunch of file space too.

This week I should be receiving my (used) Speedy 300. Having never done any laser engraving or cutting I suspect I will be full of obvious newbie questions. I've already been asking advice on setting up the machine and ducting etc, so I can get things prepped prior to the big delivery.

What limitations will I have with only 30 watts?

Speed and power settings are going to be a new concept again. Last time I learned about it was when I burned up wood and broke bits until I figured out what I could or couldn't do on my Shopbot. At least with the laser I won't break any bits.

I'm very familiar with creating design files for CNC cutting so at least I'm not coming into this totally blind.
Trotec Job Control software will be completely new to me but I have some experience with Corel and other sign design software.

This is going to be an exciting month for me! Hopefully not too frustrating. Learning a new software can always be challenging (for me) if it's not designed with an intuitive user interface or if the steps to accomplish a given task are not clear.

Any suggestions for what kinds of materials to practice on while learning?

[Chris J Anderson]

Awesome video's Scott, thank you for your efforts.
After using an Epilog print driver for years, its hard to get your head around the Trotec job setup, but I can see it will be very powerful once I get used to it.

@Shawn regarding macbook.
I use a pac book pro with win8.1 running in fusion.
Only loaded Trotec software yesterday, it works a treat.
Coreldraw x6 runs nice on it as well, and I use Epilog as well, all good. (USB).

[Jiten Patel]

Nice job on the videos!

I find using markers to place multiple jobs easier than using grid-lines as they are harder to accidentally move. We have tons of jigs, so we set each up, position the head, use F8 to mark the position out and do the same for the rest of the jig. Save the file, label the jig and done. If only there was an option to position multiple times and snap to marker at the same time and positioning a 100+ jobs a bed takes far too much time!

[Scott Shepherd]

Thanks to all who have commented. I have many more plans, but I updated my desktop computer and I cannot locate my Corel disc, so the device I captured the videos on isn't available to use without that disc. I've turned the place upside down about 5 times and can't figure out where in the world the disc would could be. At this point, I'm dead in the water until I buy another version of Corel, which isn't in the plans at the moment. I have the key, I just don't have the disc. If anyone has X5 and wants to loan me the disc long enough to load it and use my key, I'm happy to do so and return it.

[Scott Shepherd]

Duh.....googled CorelDraw X5 and downloaded it from Corel. Entered my key and we are back in action on the Corel front.

Wish it didn't take me 3 months to figure that out!

[Andrew Holloway]

Good to hear you are back in action. I am a new Trotec owner and I found your videos very helpful. Thankyou.

[Dan Hintz]

Steve,

If you need a (hard)copy of the disc, let me know...

[Bert Kemp]

Steve

You're the spittin' image of Festus.
He does kinda look like Festus :D

[Ross Moshinsky]

Thanks for answering my other questions this weekend Steve. I just watched your two videos and I have a pretty simple question along the same lines to what we were discussing with the ULS.

Video #2. You're sending over the "Trotec Training" plate. You have the plate setup as 3.99" x 1.365". My question is, why type the same size again in the Trotec Print Preferences? Why not select "Take from Application" or use a different option in the drop down menu rather than "User Defined"?

[Scott Shepherd]

Thanks for answering my other questions this weekend Steve. I just watched your two videos and I have a pretty simple question along the same lines to what we were discussing with the ULS.

Video #2. You're sending over the "Trotec Training" plate. You have the plate setup as 3.99" x 1.365". My question is, why type the same size again in the Trotec Print Preferences? Why not select "Take from Application" or use a different option in the drop down menu rather than "User Defined"?

No problem Ross. That's a GREAT question! My answer is simple. Because I can't get that to work :) I've tried it many times. I even tried it after our PM's the other day. Nope, still can't get it to work. In theory, it's supposed to do exactly what you were asking about. In CorelDraw, in the options page, in the global settings, there's a section of check boxes and one of them says "Send Bezier curves". There's another box in that section that says "Allow job size to be sent" or something like that. I checked that box, which I'm told I have to, to make it work. However, when I send a 2" x 3" job from Corel, with a page size of 17" x 24" in the actual driver, it should send a 2" x 3" job over, but it doesn't, it sends a 17" x 24" job over.

Since I don't use it, I've never tried to flush that bug out. I was told years ago that that feature was intended to be used with AutoCAD. However, I got a call from someone in Universal several months ago, asking me why I didn't use it. I explained it was told that it was for AutoCAD and they said that it was no longer for that alone, but worked much better now across a lot of programs and that I should start using it. I tried it immediately, emailed one of their application guys and asked him if I was doing it right and he told me I had all the settings right. However, it never worked.

I very well could have something set wrong, but I've not tried it since I'm so used to not using it. But in theory, it should do exactly what you were trying to do.

[Ross Moshinsky]

I had a demo with a Speedy 300 and I can half answer my own question.

1. The feature only works on Corel Draw X5+ (According to the manual).
2. It seems to read the info from the saved Corel Draw file. So if you make your plate size 5x7. Save it. Then send it as "Take from Application" it seemed to work. If you make a change, don't save, and then send it over, it will send over whatever was saved in the file. If no file is saved, it seemed to default to previous sizes or the size in the driver. I didn't really figure that out.

It seems the best method remains to draw a box around the artwork and have it crop to the artwork as the default. Obviously use a color that won't result in any engraving or cutting.

It's funny how you can take for granted little features.

[Mike Null]

Ross
I'm not sure this applies but you can save custom plate sizes. More often than not I select the item I want to engrave and send it without a plate. I have my default set to quarter sheet which is the bulk of my engraving.

If I want to move the laser to a specific point on the material I use "engrave selected" and "minimize to job size".

[Ross Moshinsky]

Yeah, there are a lot of different ways to tackle this. None of them are a real issue. I'm just trying to avoid typing in the plate size twice or having a lot of presets. Drawing a box around the plate and doing "minimize to job size" or the equivalent on a ULS is not the biggest deal in the world.

I've found more and more people are used to running sheet goods and we only do that part of the time. A lot of what we engrave is finished goods and sizing is incredibly important. A lot of this stuff is not standard sized anymore. Acrylics that used to be very close to 3.5" x 5" are now only relatively close to those specs. Being a little careless can result in things getting off 1/32+ pretty easily and that's when the naked eye can start noticing things being off center.

[Bob WrightNC]

Steve, as you know, I've been asking about the software for the rayjet versus the speedy 300. Looks to me like you could do ganging of jobs quite a bit easier in this software than on the rayjet. Does the software "store" jobs for you to pull from, or does it only have like the last 20 or so that went into the que?

[Scott Shepherd]

Yes Bob, it stores them in a que. You could have 1000's in there, I suppose. You can also save a job out of Job Control as well, so if you have really repetitive things and don't want to leave them in the que, you could save them. It's rare for me to do that, I tend to just keep the repeat jobs in the que and drag and drop them on the plate when I need them, then put them back in the que when I'm done.

[Bob WrightNC]

Steve, as you know, I've been asking about the software for the rayjet versus the speedy 300. Looks to me like you could do ganging of jobs quite a bit easier in this software than on the rayjet. Does the software "store" jobs for you to pull from, or does it only have like the last 20 or so that went into the que?

Ah ha, answer in the second video. Wow, this really has me thinking about the software very hard. Thanks.

[Mayo Pardo]

Has anyone here downloaded the latest Job Control ver. 10.5 ?
I'm wondering if there is anything new in it that will be of benefit versus running 10.3 or 10.4...
for a Speedy 300 30W ? Or is the latest version primarily for newer machines with additional features like sonic focus or job vision camera etc.

[Dan Hintz]

When it comes to these machines, I'm of the following opinion: "Don't upgrade the firmware unless you need to fix a bug or a new feature would seriously impact your workflow for the better."

[Scott Shepherd]

You can move the colors around, so they aren't hard coded in now. That's quite helpful.

Vector sorting now cuts the inner parts before the outer parts.

If either of those help you, it might be worth considering.

[Andrew Holloway]

For me this is a very worthy update.
The inner geometries first is the best part for me. Although, I do seem to have problems with it with files that have a lot of vector lines. They seem to never get through to the job queue and cause the print spooler service to fail.
I find resorting the colours quite useful too.
I don't have sonar focus or vision so can't comment on those.

[Keith Outten]

The vector sorting option was one that I asked for several years ago. It makes cutting large numbers of small letters and numbers much easier for ADA signs.
.

[Jack Clague]

Vector sorting is something I was about to ask for as i was finding it a pain that the outer cut was being done first then the inner cuts, this will be an immediate upgrade for me.

[Scott Shepherd]

Vector sorting is something I was about to ask for as i was finding it a pain that the outer cut was being done first then the inner cuts, this will be an immediate upgrade for me.

I beta tested JCX and ran it for about 6 months or so before it was released. I know Keith got it about the same time I did to test as well. I did a conference call with the guy who wrote the software after using it for about 4-5 months, I guess, if memory serves me well. At that time, we're talking about 3 years ago, I said a few things to them....

1) You need to cut the inner before the outer
2) You need to be able to move the order of the colors (it was a massive problem for me, since the colors on our files from years of using other lasers weren't in those color orders.
3) You need to be able to change the speed/power settings on the fly for all colors, not just red and black. Just red and black makes no sense at all.
4) You need to be able to change settings for a one time run, without overwriting the master material file (some times you just need to change something for THAT piece of material)


Those were my big ones. It's sad that it's taken 3 years to get some of them into place (while others still aren't incorporated), but they are a very methodical company. I'm also sure that some changes are much deeper than we believe. We might think something is quite simple and easy to put into place, but in reality, it might be rewriting massive amounts of code that impacts the entire system because it wasn't written that was in the beginning.

They do tend to fix things right, which is a very good thing. I just wish they fixed them quicker!

When I complained to Universal about being able to move colors around, and why (we went from Epilog to Universal) it needed to be an option, less than a few months passed and it was an option.

[Mayo Pardo]

Thanks for the replies everyone -

I've had vector sorting in ver. 10.22 so unless it's been further improved, that wouldn't cause me to update.
Did they get rid of the annoying non related message about the plate size that pops up when you click to engrave from the bottom up?
The ability to change color order would be good if I ever started making files with multiple settings linked to the colors but so far I get by on everything with just red (cutting), black (engraving), and blue (positioning).

It would be nice if the paste feature did not automatically snap to the top left corner.
Right-click where you want to paste, then select paste would save a little time when manually laying out multiples.

Can you move selected objects on the plate by using the arrow keys? I know how to do it numerically but not with the arrow keys...

[Scott Shepherd]

Thanks for the replies everyone -

I've had vector sorting in ver. 10.22 so unless it's been further improved, that wouldn't cause me to update.

Mayo, it's not Vector Sorting that is new, that's been out since day 1 of JCX. It's the sorting by cutting the inside before cutting the outside of shapes which is new (and years overdue). That alone wrecked my job flow years ago. On all files from our Universal, we used 1 color for vector cutting because it cut the inside of small items before cutting the outside. Thinking about cutting something like a ring shape. It would cut the inside before the outside automatically. Then comes the Trotec and if you use the same color, it may cut the outside before cutting the inside. If it's a small item, that's a major problem because you just cut the outside, the part falls into the grid, then it comes back later to cut the inside. It meant we had to redo every file we ran on the Trotec to have 2 colors for vector cutting, one color for the inside, one for the outside. It might not seem like a big deal, but if you are doing ADA signs and cutting out a 12" x 24" piece of material that's completely full of 3/4" tall letters, you've got a major issue.

As for the other things you mentioned, I don't believe you'll see any fixes for those in this release.

[Jack Clague]

Thanks for the replies everyone -

I've had vector sorting in ver. 10.22 so unless it's been further improved, that wouldn't cause me to update.
Did they get rid of the annoying non related message about the plate size that pops up when you click to engrave from the bottom up?
The ability to change color order would be good if I ever started making files with multiple settings linked to the colors but so far I get by on everything with just red (cutting), black (engraving), and blue (positioning).

It would be nice if the paste feature did not automatically snap to the top left corner.
Right-click where you want to paste, then select paste would save a little time when manually laying out multiples.

Can you move selected objects on the plate by using the arrow keys? I know how to do it numerically but not with the arrow keys...


Hi Mayo,

I'm getting that error recently as well, when I move a job to the plate is said that it does not match the current plate settings and would I like to continue using the current plate settings, i've only seen this recently, what causes this?

[Mayo Pardo]

Scott, I don't know if I got lucky or what but when I selected Vector Sorting, most of the time it did cut the centers before the outer shapes.

Jack - the error message you mentioned I believe is coming from a setting that you haven't selected.
If I'm talking about a different error message here then this may not apply!

A couple places to check in Corel -
First go to File, then Print Setup, and with the Trotec printer/driver selected, it will open a window - within the Page: box see if you have "Match orientation and size" as your selection. If not, change it to that.

Next, with sample text entered in Corel, and placed within your defined page area, select the text and then go to File, Print.
In the screen that opens, under the General tab, select Preferences. The Trotec engraver properties window opens. Select the tab marked "Print". You should have either "Bed Size" or "User Defined Size" and put a check mark next to "Take from application" and also "Minimize to job size". Click OK. Now you're back to the Print window. Under the setting for Print Range, select "Selection" then click Apply, then click Print if you want to print the test text.

People also say this error comes from having your page size in Corel the exact same size as the Trotec bed. If you reduce your Corel page size to slightly under the actual bed size, this can also eliminate the problem however making the changes I mentioned above worked for me permanently. Merely changing the page size in Corel did not always eliminate the error message for me.

Also, make sure you are not accidentally sending to the printer a page border or other objects that you don't intend to engrave or cut. If the above printer settings are not made, you could be sending objects to the printer that are outside of your Corel page and when included with the objects within the page, it's too big for the Trotec bed.

[Glen Monaghan]

Scott, I don't know if I got lucky or what but when I selected Vector Sorting, most of the time it did cut the centers before the outer shapes.


I think you just got lucky. I was running a job a couple of days ago and forgot to turn off vector sorting first (I have everything sorted in object manager the way I want them cut). A minute or so into the cutting, I realized my mistake but noticed that it was cutting the insides first, then outsides, so I let it continue. About half way through the job, though, it cut an outside first, and the small shape dropped down onto the bed and bounced slightly to one side. When the beam started the interior cuts, it was out of focus and offset, ruining that part. Happened again a couple more times before I just stopped the job and selectively ran the rest with sorting turned off.

[Raphael Weil]

Great videos. Man this system is a quantum leap from the Full Spectrum I'm used to.

I'd love to know a bit more about this setup: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=33uWTYtE9SI


It's something like this? https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=T8T6S5eFpqE

[Raphael Weil]

Question for you job control guys. My rep showed me the setting to have the laser trace the perimeter of the job to help aligning your work. My question is this:

on an FSL it's smart enough to run the perimeter once and end back where you started. On the Speedy 300 when I do it it will only stop tracing the perimeter when you hit cancel and it'll stop at whatever random point the laser head was in when it received the stop order. Is there a smarter way to do that other than logging the laser coordinates when you started placing your piece? I wish Trotec would make the laser go back to where it started when you hit cancel.

[Mike Null]

Raphael

I'm not sure I understand why you need to "trace" the perimeter nor do I understand why you use cancel. Is it something the pause button would do?

The machine can be set to return to start when you finish the job.

[Raphael Weil]

Raphael

I'm not sure I understand why you need to "trace" the perimeter nor do I understand why you use cancel. Is it something the pause button would do?

The machine can be set to return to start when you finish the job.

Hi Mike,

let's say you were trying to position an engraving on a given object. There's a function that just moves the red light pointer to follow the dimensions of your piece as a preparation before engraving. On the FSL it just does one orbit around the perimeter of your engraving. On the Trotec it just keeps spinning until you hit cancel.

[Mike Null]

I usually position my red dot to the center of the area then move the drawing to the red dot (laser).

[Raphael Weil]

I usually position my red dot to the center of the area then move the drawing to the red dot (laser).

Wow that's really interesting, I'd never contemplated doing it that way. Any reason why you wouldn't want to make use of one of the laser bed corners and start in say the top left corner for items that were squared off? I'm all for doing it a better way if there is one. Just trying to figure out if finding the exact middle of my items is a longer process than the way I do it now.

[Mike Null]

Raphael

There are several jobs I do where I have to load the item one at a time and I center the item under the red dot then push the repeat button. Last week i did 600 pan lids with cermark.

the other reason I do that is to use up a specific area of a plastic sheet. For example, there may be enough left to do 4 name tags or labels. I move the red dot to the area of the sheet that will accommodate the job then send the drawing to JC and move the drawing to the laser.

The upper left corner is my start point for much of my work including metal for plaques.

[Raphael Weil]

Raphael

There are several jobs I do where I have to load the item one at a time and I center the item under the red dot then push the repeat button. Last week i did 600 pan lids with cermark.

the other reason I do that is to use up a specific area of a plastic sheet. For example, there may be enough left to do 4 name tags or labels. I move the red dot to the area of the sheet that will accommodate the job then send the drawing to JC and move the drawing to the laser.

The upper left corner is my start point for much of my work including metal for plaques.

ah ok, so we basically do it the same way for a plaque style object (I engrave wooden frames). Since my wooden frames may not be 100% square (but close), I find that mode that runs the perimeter allows me to see if I need to nudge the frame by a 32nd of an inch or something so that my design winds up as close to center as possible.

[Mike Null]

Raphael

One of the tools I find useful is a draftsman's triangle. I have a 30-60-90 and 45-90. I buy them with as long a leg as possible for positioning items of questionable dimension and squareness. They're easy enough to make with your laser if you have some material.

[Mayo Pardo]

Raphael
I have the same problem with the job trace function, where it stops at some random point after you hit cancel.
Maybe it completes whatever got loaded into the memory buffer before cancel is hit? I haven't found a setting that will make it automatically return to where it started.
It's an extra step but what I do is select Move Laser, and then manually enter the coordinates that are shown in the X-Y location boxes to put the laser back where it started.

[Neville Stewart]

For repositioning after a trace, I add a "marker to laser" when I've centered or selected default, when I'm done outlining, I just stop and then select "move laser to marker" (the previously positioned marker) et voila!