'Best method' question

[Graham Taylor]

Hi guys,

I need to cut various shapes of different size and complexity out of some 2mm greyboard but I need the following


to stay on the A4 sheet when I lift it out of the laser and into the packaging
be cut enough that they pop out easily

I have got the cut settings ok but due to the different sizes some fall out and some dont so my question is:-

I assume that I need to put tiny links/bridges or whatever you want to call them onto the shapes that are falling out. Is this the best method? I am sure I read something about 'links' on the Trotec manuals but cant find it so will have to do a search tomorrow.

Any help or suggestions would be greatfully recieved.

Cheers,

Graham

[Scott Shepherd]

Hi Graham, you are right, "Links" is what you want to use on the Trotec. Go into the settings (the gear) and you'll find the settings for it in there. You can specify how much to reduce the power and how often the tabs occur. Tell is to use tabs "All the time". Then in your material settings, where it shows the Correction and High Quality option boxes, there is a box for Link. Turn that on.

It'll automatically add tabs to everything and it works FANTASTIC for what you are trying to do.

It's one of those things that I laugh about when people say "I don't need Job Control, it doesn't do anything special". Oh yes it does! And this is one of them. Literally, in 20 seconds, you can have tabs on everything that's already drawn. No need to redraw a single thing.

Edit- It's under the Gear, under "Process Options".

[Mike Null]

I didn't know that!!!

Of course, even after 10 years, there's more I don't know about Job Control than I know. It's just fantastic operating software.

[Tony Lenkic]

Likewise Mike,

We are doing repetition work and these things never pop up in our operation. It is educational just reading what others do on daily bases.

[Graham Taylor]

Hi Graham, you are right, "Links" is what you want to use on the Trotec. Go into the settings (the gear) and you'll find the settings for it in there. You can specify how much to reduce the power and how often the tabs occur. Tell is to use tabs "All the time". Then in your material settings, where it shows the Correction and High Quality option boxes, there is a box for Link. Turn that on.

It'll automatically add tabs to everything and it works FANTASTIC for what you are trying to do.

It's one of those things that I laugh about when people say "I don't need Job Control, it doesn't do anything special". Oh yes it does! And this is one of them. Literally, in 20 seconds, you can have tabs on everything that's already drawn. No need to redraw a single thing.

Edit- It's under the Gear, under "Process Options".


All sorted, thanks Scott

[Bill Carruthers]

It'll automatically add tabs to everything and it works FANTASTIC for what you are trying to do.
It's one of those things that I laugh about when people say "I don't need Job Control, it doesn't do anything special". Oh yes it does! And this is one of them. Literally, in 20 seconds, you can have tabs on everything that's already drawn. No need to redraw a single thing..

Just an FYI note to those using Chinese machines and RD Works - RDW also has a very similar - if not identical,- feature called "Bridge" which is under the "Handle" tab - it allows you to choose the tab size and whether you want tabs spaced at a given distance or just use 2,3 or whatever number you want of tabs. I find it works really well.

[Scott Shepherd]

Just an FYI note to those using Chinese machines and RD Works - RDW also has a very similar - if not identical,- feature called "Bridge" which is under the "Handle" tab - it allows you to choose the tab size and whether you want tabs spaced at a given distance or just use 2,3 or whatever number you want of tabs. I find it works really well.

Not sure how RD Works does it, but on the Trotec, for instance, you'd tell it the specs for your tabbing and tell it to run at 90% or 95% power, so when it does the tab, it backs off the power enough to just barely not go through, so it's not skipping an entire cut area to create the tab (unless you tell it zero power). It makes things stick together just enough to be able to touch them and they come out. For certain jobs, we use it quite often.

[John Lifer]

Not that way with rdworks. It totally changes the processing. It stops at the bridge, and doesn't jump it. It goes to another vector. And when hits another bridge seemingly randomly jumps to the next. Actually kind of crazy watching it process. But it does work.

[Frank barry]

thanks a million its great to know that

[Graham Taylor]

A follow up - is it possible to just set the 'link' settiong so that it only does it on one cut line e.g. only puts the links on the red cut lines and leaves the blue cut line so that the required sheet would just fall out of the larger material sheet size?