Buying Ricoh Pro Press and Guillotine Cutter

[chriscozi]

I have been told by many print shops to not even waste time/money on an electric cutter. I currently have a Duplo-618 and Chinese 18" cutter (picked up for free). This cutter is not very accurate and also has some sort of calibration issue that I cannot 100% seem to fix.

Since I will only be printed on a maximum sheet size of 13"x19", I do not really need the bigger cutter for much. I would benefit from being able to buying larger parent sheets and cutting them down to size and faster cutting by being able to cut larger stacks vs smaller stacks.

It just really depends on what comes my way on the free marketplace. I had no intention on purchasing the Duplo, but I saw one pop up with a ~45k meter for unbelievable cheap and I couldn't pass it up.

If you are thinking parent sheets then you need a 30" minimum in my opinion as you will want to quarter or third 25x38 and 30x40 because of the available paper options/brands/GRAIN/etc. as some sizes aren't available or are constrained.
Also agreed a 2"+ stack height really does require a hydraulic clamp for best results.
You will most likely run up on 'quality' issues when you get critical cutting as digital printers can be notoriously variable in image and duplex position.
YMMV.

 

[Ynot_UK]

I currently have a Duplo-618 and Chinese 18" cutter (picked up for free). This cutter is not very accurate and also has some sort of calibration issue that I cannot 100% seem to fix.

No surprise there about the Chinese cutter. I'd be more scared of the safeties failing on it TBH.
We have an Ideal 4850-95EP programmable SRA2 cutter with an electric clamp which has been great, a very accurate compact machine, with both coated and uncoated stocks
If we had the space, a Polar 66 would be our cutter of choice, however its footprint is simply too large for the shop

 

[Sammkrtch]

No surprise there about the Chinese cutter. I'd be more scared of the safeties failing on it TBH.
We have an Ideal 4850-95EP programmable SRA2 cutter with an electric clamp which has been great, a very accurate compact machine, with both coated and uncoated stocks
If we had the space, a Polar 66 would be our cutter of choice, however its footprint is simply too large for the shop

Yah, luckily the space is not an issue for what we are looking for. I have heard that the Challenge Titan (200 or 305) is the "Toyota" of guillotine cutters, and I tend to see alot more of those used pop up.

 

[kslight]

Yah, luckily the space is not an issue for what we are looking for. I have heard that the Challenge Titan (200 or 305) is the "Toyota" of guillotine cutters, and I tend to see alot more of those used pop up.

Yeah we have a Challenge Champion that certainly looks like it’s from the 70s…aside from minor maintenance and having to send the controller off because the screen went bad last year…it’s been just fine. I haven’t been to many shops that are using brand new cutters, almost everyone has some relic from the Cold War.