# Brother PR-600 question



## xfuture (Oct 4, 2014)

Hello, I just picked up a Brother PR-600 machine. My question is do you guys think this will handle 3D letters on cap fronts? 

Thanks !


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## graphicsonthefly (Oct 6, 2014)

Yes it will. Mine does puff embroidery just fine. Use a foam made for embroidery instead of craft foam for better results.


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## tfalk (Apr 3, 2008)

The machine basically does not care... it will stitch whatever you tell it to as long as the file is digitized correctly for the underlying garment. Can you stitch puff on caps on a PR600? Absolutely, as long as you can live with a max design height of 2 inches. The machine can be upgraded to use the 2 1/8 2nd generation cap frames but you need the hardware upgrade kit and they can be hard to find at times. For running puffy foam, you need to use less thread tension than you would for flats...

Join the PR600 Yahoo group - lots of good info there, just don't piss off the moderators, they tend to have a short fuse at times.


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## xfuture (Oct 4, 2014)

Thanks guys! I just would like to have maybe 1/4 incheck puff letters on fronts of caps to get them some depth. It Seely to be trendy these days. I purchased one a few weeks ago on a ball cap that had a thick lining behind the front area, so they didn't even use any sort of matting.. just piled up the stitches. .. good to know this machine can handle it even though it is a older model. 

Thanks for the help!


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## xfuture (Oct 4, 2014)

Any recommendations on Digitizing software? I design in illustrator and want to find a simple solution that will output to the file type needed for the PR600. 

I have PE 6.... that came with the used machine... but it's a designer... anyway around that? 

Thanks!


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## tfalk (Apr 3, 2008)

The only people who will tell you their software will take an image or vector and automatically create an embroidery file are the people selling the software. I haven't seen one yet that will produce a good stitch file every time. In most cases, it's easier to just digitize it from scratch than it is to auto-digitize and waste time modifying the result.

I've seen people post that Wings works well with Corel but you still need to modify the result. I use Corel and import shapes into Embroidery Office as a starting point. And no, I personally would never recommend anyone purchase Embroidery Office or anything else from Sierra. If I had the money, I'd trade it in on Wilcom in a heartbeat.


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## tfalk (Apr 3, 2008)

BTW, if you are trying to automatically create a Puff Foam file from a vector or raster image, good luck with that, it is NOT going to happen... Puff foam designs require very unique digitizing and there are no programs out there that will automatically create them, at least none that I have ever heard of.


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## xfuture (Oct 4, 2014)

These are just fonts that I want to raise off the front of the hat. I have done some video research and it looks like you just let the machine draw outlines then stop, and pultimately away access then let it do fill work... for puff....sound about right?


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## tfalk (Apr 3, 2008)

Nope... fonts or anything need to be specifically digitized for foam underneath. If you do not cap the ends correctly, the foam will not get trimmed and will stick out from the ends.

Think of the letter L for example. Most non-foam digitizing will start at either end and stitch to the other end. If you do that, the foam will not be capped at either end and stick out of both ends. When you digitize for foam, you stitch a perpendicular row at one end, running stitch to the other end, perpendicular row to the end, then stitch over the top from one end to the other.

There is another thread about this here: 

http://www.t-shirtforums.com/embroidery/t72943.html


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## moosevalley (Jan 5, 2011)

whats the upgrade kit for the hat hoop?


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## xfuture (Oct 4, 2014)

What do you mean by 2in design height? Depth of the puff? Or how tall the overall design can be? Example: from top of letter to bottom of letter is 2 inches tall?


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## tfalk (Apr 3, 2008)

moosevalley said:


> whats the upgrade kit for the hat hoop?


The PR600's were originally only capable of using the 2 inch tall cap frames. When the PR620/650 models came out, they were designed for the 2nd generation cap frames which could sew up to 2 1/8 inch tall. Brother came out with an upgrade kit for the earlier PR600 models to be able to use the taller frames. IIRC, it's a control board that needs to be installed in the arm and a magnet that has to be placed on the cap frame driver... I never bought one but I did consider it and looked into it at one point... We ended up trading in one of our PR600's on a PR1000 that came with the 270 degree cap frame.



xfuture said:


> What do you mean by 2in design height? Depth of the puff? Or how tall the overall design can be? Example: from top of letter to bottom of letter is 2 inches tall?


2 inches from bottom of the design to the top of the design. The PR600 cap frame and driver supports a maximum size of 2 inch tall and 5 inch wide designs. I think in reality it's closer to 1.95 inches tall and 4.92 inches wide since the machine really only recognizes the cap frames as 50 millimeters tall and 125 mm wide... I am not sure how thick foam you can really use, I would think you would need to run the machine slower as the foam thickness increases... In any event, the PR600's will stitch at a maximum of 600 stitches per minute when the cap frame driver is on the machine...


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