Rotary Engraver

[Brian Gumpper]

Looking for a decent quality rotary engraver and wanted to see what the current opinions are. Looking at Roland EGX-350 but would consider other options. Would mostly be making name badges, signs ... The only concern I have about the Roland is the USB1 interface and Windows Vista is the latest software they support. Makes me think it's an old design but I guess if it works then would just have to repurpose an old computer.

[Mike Null]

My preference is Newing Hall followed by Vision. I would recommend Gravograph if not for their notoriously bad support. Roland would probably be my last choice.

[Kev Williams]

I'll recommend Gravograph simply because you rarely need any support (and they are getting better)

--I will say, the trick to good support, at least in my case is I have a local NH/Gravo rep, who's been my rep for 43 years. Regardless of what brand you end up buying, it would be good to check to see if you can locate ANY engraver company reps within 100 miles of you....

[Mike Null]

Kev
That may not be likely. With Newing Hall they handled everything well by telephone. When I had a Gravo the local rep was the one who made me swear off and their HQ wasn't any better. I do agree that they make good stuff.

[Brian Gumpper]

Looking at the Newing Hall website seems like they all have elaborate controllers on them. I understand why but isn't there a machine that is just that, a machine where all the say text and font selection is done by a computer and sent to the controller in the engraver?

[Kev Williams]

That controller isn't as elaborate as it seems, and all machines need a controller for slewing the cutter head for alignment, setting cutter depth, choosing jobs, manually setting parameters, etc... N-Hall machines have on-the-fly speed adjustments which adds a couple of buttons or knobs- In use you'll only used a few buttons regularly, and learn the others as you go

Too bad you had to deal with turds, Mike. My rep, I can call him any time day or night with an issue and he'll answer the phone, and if I need something- like when the power supply in my IS7000 died, or just a set of motor brushes, he'll be here within a half hour with a loaner power supply and a set of brushes. I've had okay luck with the factory, but it's always been thru him. And only 3 times ever, so there's that