# vinyl cutting software alternative



## dhoard (May 31, 2016)

Hi all,

My wife and I recently got a 24" cutter for cutting various signs, etc.

I found out that software that was part of the package we bought is licensed / activated / locked to a single PC (her laptop.)

Since we use Corel, I decided to write a Windows application that would take a PLT / HPGL file exported from Corel and send it to the cutter over the serial port.

Are most / all cutters HPGL ? Does anyone think there is a market for this software ? ... assuming a price of $20 ?

Thanks,

-Doug


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## BrianHahn (Dec 29, 2013)

Many cutter manufacturers provide this utility and mount the cutter as a printer to allow you to do this. (Saga does for instance) If you are doing this yourself, what you will need to add is the blade offset and reconfiguring of the path to allow for a drag knife. The loop sent to the cutter is not the same as the path created by Corel / Illustrator. Assuming you have a drag knife system, your end result will have rounded corners due to the blade offset.

Which cutter do you have? Perhaps that utility is already out there for you.


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## dhoard (May 31, 2016)

I have a Vinyl Express EnduraCut2.

The program I wrote works fine ... not wasn't sure if it was a common program / problem people run across.

-Doug


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## BrianHahn (Dec 29, 2013)

Create a sharp corner, like a star, and cut it. Do the points of the star have little radii or are they sharp?
Maybe your cutter has blade offset built in so if you send it an actual path it will compensate for the blade offset in the firmware.


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## dhoard (May 31, 2016)

Sharp corners.

-Doug


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## BrianHahn (Dec 29, 2013)

It appears your good then. Perhaps what they mean by tangential emulation is that the cutter compensates for blade offset internally. It says it has built in overtravel which means that the cutter automatically extends the cut path to overcut the loop by a certain amount to avoid hang ups at the start/end point of the loop.


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## mfatty500 (Jan 18, 2010)

I'm confused, why don't you just use cutting master 2 or 3 with Corel? Depending on which version of Corel Draw you have


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## dhoard (May 31, 2016)

Cut master 3 doesn't work - doesn't recognize my cutter. Worth a try though.

-Doug


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## dcbevins (Jul 31, 2011)

SignCut Pro has CorelDraw plugins.


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