A Guide to using the Silhouette Cameo Cutter

[JCL]

Yer up early mate. never underestimate the ability for Canada Post in rural BC to take a relaxed view of mail delivery I hope you have plenty of styrene!

[uax6]

I'm early turn for today and tomorrow, then back on your time zone on Monday night!

 

I'm sure your postal system is just as lax as the good old RM here!

 

I have a small stack of 10 thou, and a larger stack of 20thou. I feel I might have to order loads more 10 and some 15 thou now. Mind you tweeking things is a pain in the bottom, I spent and hour and a half last night just drawing regisration marks on that MK5 file to try and work out whats wrong with the registration. So far nothing found! Tonight I'm going to investigate the droplight and bolection layers as these seem the two worst....

 

Andy G

[JCL]

Remember to squint, I find it helps

[uax6]

I found I was going boss-eyed at times!

 

Soon be time to open the box!

 

Andy G

[MikeTrice]

Hi Mike, if the cutter hasn't been put away already, any chance of a bit of a review of the CB09 blade holder?

Too late unfortunately. Will see if I can do something at the weekend.

[MikeTrice]

Curiosity got the better of me. How did these things cut?

 

The first image is of a standard, current, Silhouette cutter. It comes with a grey "cap" that can be used to rotate the white end to extend or retract the cutting blade:

 

Extending the blade to its full depth and viewing it from the side the 45 degree angle can be seen:

 

Turn it through 90 degrees and the blade seen from the end, or non-cutting edge:

 

These original cutters are quite expensive so a lot of Silhouette users have purchased third party cutter holders and blades. Here is the CB09 (without blade fitted) mentioned in previous threads:

 

There have been comments on other threads that the CB09 does not always fit the machine and needs sanding down with wet and dry. Mine fitted perfectly.

 

The cutter holder strips down as shown. The brass part is held on by rare earth magnet:

 

Here is one of the third party blades but I really could not see how it would cut:

 

OK, call it a senior moment   The blade part is protected by the red rubber protector. I had photographed it upside down. Removing the protector reveals a blade as in the original. Doh!

 

No instructions come with the CB09 however there are a couple of web sites showing how to fit the blade to it.

 

When I get the machine out again I will try the new cutter out.

 

 

 

[MikeTrice]

Oh well, in for a penny......

 

The blade comes with a spring that fits over the shaft, like a sprung buffer:

 

 

There is a brass bush in the black cap that the blade fits through:

 

Having shown that the blade/spring is removed from the end and the non cutting end "stuck" to the magnetic bush in the holder:

 

Carefully thread the cutting blade through the black bush and screw the cap to the holder:

 

Note that the CB09 does not include a measuring scale to help adjust the blade depth that protrudes.

 

Blade has now been retracted and packed away with the machine until a later date.

[katwigan]

Errrr Mike , I wasn't aware that Brass was attracted to any form of Magnet, that MUST be some rare earth type.  . Irrespective that coach side ! I would hate to try and cut those window frame inserts out by hand    

Same goes for Andy G's, wow there should be a complete thread on the full job there mate!

 

Hopefully my CB09 holder and 60 deg blades should turn up shortly, must also try the styrene out too .

This has to be about the best thread running currently ,certainly is the most informative, perhaps it should be kept a secret, shhh, there's somebody coming.

 

Kev

[uax6]

I agree that we seem to have stumbled on to a very interesting area, and for me one that has finally allowed some of my dreams to be realised!

 

I am flattered that you feel that I should start another thread on my coach sides, I suppose that you are probably right, only the cutting part of it belongs here, although techniques will probably improve over time, which would be relevent here. Jason what do you think?

 

Mike that holder looks very good, so can't wait for mine to arrive and to have some time to have a play with the cutter (hopefully next week, as i still haven't had it out of the box yet!).

 

I think we might need to 'develop' a proper scoring blade somehow. It must be possible to do, and looking at the close ups of those aftermarket blades I wonder if a sleeve could be fitted to a cutdown shaft and a squawker style blade fitted? Although I've just thought.. what stops the blade rotating in the holder?

 

Andy G

[JCL]

I think you're right about moving posts about generally producing coach sides using the cutter into a separate thread, but having a basic tutorial here. If you put the silhouette cameo and silhouette portrait as tags then they will tie together. Also, I can amend the index to reference them.

 

I'm looking at creating a proper scorer when I get back to town - watch this space.

Edited December 5, 2013 by JCL

[uax6]

Right, what I'll do is start a new thread for my coaches (it'll stop boring people on here!), and maybe Mike can do the same for his?

 

Mind you, anything which I think is relevant that i find as I go along I'll post on here too.

 

Jason I'm going to watch with interest for your scriber, you might get orders!

 

Andy G

[allan downes]

Though I don't understand a word of it, I think this thread is brilliant and if it's kept going, scratchbuilt  coaching stock will never look better !

 

Brilliant  stuff and definately a major break through in model making.

 

Allan.

[uax6]

Well I hope we don't disappoint you Allan!

 

I have started a thread for my coaches and will probably put some pictures up of the pre-silhouette versions first. Head to it from my signature!

 

Andy G

Edited December 5, 2013 by uax6

[allan downes]

Looking foreward to it Andy, a legend in the making no less !!

 

I remember Jim Whittaker the legendary coach builder in the RM many, many years ago, and one can't even start to imagine what he would have achieved with the kind of technology we have at our fingertips to day and, as we speak, I have just ordered several sheets of etched windows and valancing from Scalelink where I intend to do a step-by-step station build for the forum - where was all that stuff back in the 70's ?! - it was all down to stretched cotton for glazing bars that sagged no sooner had the model been built and impossible to get at !

 

Cheers.

Allan.

[uax6]

Glup! I don't know I'd go as far as a leg-end!

 

No pressure there then! ;-}

 

Andy G

[JCL]

You definitely aren't boring us at all! It'd be great if you could carry on showing us new techniques that you have found, and ways you can push the machine to the edge of what it can do. Already between us all we have managed to put up more information on this one thread about specifically using the machines for modelling than I've found anywhere else on the internet! I can't wait to see what you come up with - a Scottish flavoured cattle or sheep van maybe?

[Siberian Snooper]

Hi All

 

I came across this thread a couple of evenings ago and have finally read it all the way through. I am another convert I have just ordered a machine, unfortunately due to my somewhat erratic shift pattern these days I am having it delivered to my brothers, so I won't be able to get me mit's on it 'til Christmas.

 

However this will allow me to produce some artwork in Autocad which I can export as a DXF file, I hope this will work, any tips or advice welcomed.

 

SS

[MikeTrice]

I think we might need to 'develop' a proper scoring blade somehow. It must be possible to do, and looking at the close ups of those aftermarket blades I wonder if a sleeve could be fitted to a cutdown shaft and a squawker style blade fitted? Although I've just thought.. what stops the blade rotating in the holder?

Good luck with that. Nothing stops the blade rotating, it is supposed to. What I have not fathomed is how it physically works. I guess when the blade moves horizontally, the tip is slightly off centre so tends to drag causing the cutting edge to align with the cut. The blade part is tiny but it might be possible with the replacement blades to resharpen the blade and reuse. Someone somewhere will come up with a method.

[Ron Heggs]

My Cameo was delivered on Tuesday to my daughter in the UK. It will be transported by my eldest daughter back to Spain next Wednesday

 

In time to do some tests before Xmas 

 

CB09 with 60^o blades on order - delivery probably in the New Year

[TheQ]

 AaaaRRGh No..... I'll have even less chance of improving my modelling to Rons' impossibly high standards!!!

My Cameo was delivered on Tuesday to my daughter in the UK. It will be transported by my eldest daughter back to Spain next Wednesday

 

In time to do some tests before Xmas 

 

CB09 with 60^o blades on order - delivery probably in the New Year

 

 

[MikeTrice]

 AaaaRRGh No..... I'll have even less chance of improving my modelling to Rons' impossibly high standards!!!

In that case I hope he posts some tips and photos.

[JCL]

Good luck with that. Nothing stops the blade rotating, it is supposed to. What I have not fathomed is how it physically works. I guess when the blade moves horizontally, the tip is slightly off centre so tends to drag causing the cutting edge to align with the cut. The blade part is tiny but it might be possible with the replacement blades to resharpen the blade and reuse. Someone somewhere will come up with a method.

I think you're right Mike, the point of the blade seems to be just off-centre and so pivots as the cutter changes direction. It will be interesting to see how long the aluminium holder blades last compared to the ones that are made specifically for the Cameo/Portrait. I'm not sure I'd be resharpening them I'm afraid.

 

The thing I'm going to try regarding the scorer is to use the pen holder I've just bought, and using a jig, centre an artists scriber or something similar in there; I'd be using a point, not a blade, so no need to rotate. That's the theory anyway as the Chomas website that sells third party accessories kinda goes that way. It's worth looking up Chomas and cameo in google if you want to look at other options.

[Alister_G]

Jason, you've really started something with this thread, well done mate!

 

I almost wonder if it's worth having a dedicated "Special Interests" section where Andy's, Mike's and other peoples threads could all be found together, as well as this thread as an introduction.

 

If members were agreeable you could also build up a repository of DXF files that others can use.

 

Just a couple of ideas,

 

Al.

[JCL]

I think you could be right there Al, I'll send Andy an email later to see that he thinks

[flubrush]

I spent and hour and a half last night just drawing regisration marks on that MK5 file to try and work out whats wrong with the registration. So far nothing found! Tonight I'm going to investigate the droplight and bolection layers as these seem the two worst....

 

Andy G

 

 

 

Andy,

 

You might have to watch out for the styrene sheet stretching under the cutting action of the blade.  This is a known problem when cutting the panelling layer out by hand.   David Jenkinson shows his method of getting round the problem in his book and I do remember a demonstrator at the London Easter show way back in the 60s advising builders to cut the panelling layers first then cut the main sides to match the size of the panelling. :-)    You could check that just by putting a ruler on the panelling layers after cutting to see if there is any stretch.

 

Jim.

Edited December 6, 2013 by flubrush