Cutting sandblast mask

[GlenP]

Does anyone have any tips for cutting sandblasting mask in the bot? My plotter decided to give me grief and is about to go out the door any second. I am doing some vertical grain cedar signs and have tried to apply mask and cut with small cutter with no success. Using Hartco mask. With vertical grain tearout seems to be a issue. Any help would be great. PS- Anyone want to buy a plotter, works great....sometimes!

[chodges]

This may not be the answer you are looking for, but we have a used Gerber GS750 sprocket-fed plotter that is designed to cut sandmasking, and we are not using it anymore.

If you think this might be a good solution for your needs, we would offer you a good price.

[GlenP]

Thanks Charlie, I am in Ontario Canada (eh) so its a bit of a distance to ship. Really want to attach the mask to the wood and then cut with stencil with bot. I know Dr. Crumley has had some success with this on foam and hoping he will chime in...please. I had to walk out of the shop a few minutes ago and take a break from the plotter. I have never used it much and if I did it was for cutting mask to apply to rocks for sandblasting so never checked for accurate cuts. If it looked good and weeded out blast away. Now I am doing a few larger signs and it seems to be cutting short on the Y axis which is the length on the plotter. Frustrating the heck out of me. I am swamped with work and don't need any delays.

[zeykr]

Charlie,
I dropped you an email about the plotter.

Ken

[GlenP]

Your welcome Charlie
, anyone got any ideas about the topic.????

[cbradshaw]

Glen,If you are not cutting real small letters it will work fine. I used a drag knife called the vinyl mate to cut it. I had to use spray adhesive to hold the material flat. If you have a zeroing attachment zero the z position and tell the bot to cut .25 and it should work fine for Hartco material. It will work, but for small letters I prefer the vinyl plotter.

ps. If you use one of these tools don't forget that you DO NOT turn the router or spindle on.

[cbradshaw]

Glen,

I just checked and this company has stopped selling the vinyl mates.
http://www.littleeholdings.com/

[GlenP]

Hi Carroll, I read somewhere on here once someone was using a small bit to cut the outline of the mask..but I think it was on HDU. I am using vertical grain cedar. I was using my plotter for the job and it seems to be acting up. It is cutting the material too small on the on axis. Really screws up curves. Support from the company is next to nil. I am going to probably have to farm out the stencil to be cut if I don't use the bot. TIme is tight now that my plotter is acting up.

[myxpykalix]

GlenP you have a 4x8 plotter in the shopbot why not use it? Search for widgetworks unlimited for a dragknife.

[zeykr]

Are you using a downcut bit? I have better luck with getting sharp edges on mask with a downcut bit or by using a good vbit such as hersaf first, then following with endmill for pocketing.