Noob in over his head. Ancient Cutter and no experience...

[ManicMarket]

So long story short, I have a marketing company and one of my projects includes laminated business cards. We decided to produce them in house as we will be doing lots of volume and we could save on production. We have everything figured out from printing to laminating, but cutting has been a pain in my side.

We received a Luigi Ing, Gianni Mandelli 58-E (not even sure if thats correct) from and old friend and have fixed it up to working order. I'm pretty sure this thing is from the 40's or something, it was quite an ordeal. However, it runs and cuts now but I can't seem to get my cuts straight. the back gauge and the blade are square, I think, but when I finish my set of cards they are all askew. There are two bolts under the cutting bed I have adjusted and can get my first cut straight but something goes wrong after that. Am I missing something? Is it a poor operator? Where could I go, on or offline, to learn about this stuff?

I look forward to hearing from you. Thanks

Jordan McBain

 

[Stickman42]

Maybe the laminated sheets are slipping as the knife goes through them? More clamping pressure necessary?

 

[ManicMarket]

Hey Stickman24,

I hadn't thought of that. Though I have been having the same problem with unlaminated stock. After the first tests i started using unlaminated sheets to test everything. I will try that though. Cheers

 

[kansasquaker]

Are you certain that the cards are printed squarely on the sheet? A lot of digital machines don't do a great job at printing the image square to the paper. Also, some will distort and/or the image from one end of the sheet to the other.

 

[ManicMarket]

They seem to me square. The first cut it always square. After some digging I have learned that when making the final cuts on business cards, I should have stacks on each end of the blade for better clamping. Duh haha

 

[pdan]

They seem to me square. The first cut it always square. After some digging I have learned that when making the final cuts on business cards, I should have stacks on each end of the blade for better clamping. Duh haha

Not sure about that...a lift (of cards) at both ends of the clamp?
The blade comes down at an angle and the sideways sweep of the blade should be into the stack, not pushing it away from the side of the bed.
Put another way, if the blade sweeps down and right, the stock should be in against the backstop and against the right edge of the cutter bed.

After cutting a stack place a card from the top (of the stack) on top of a card from the bottom of the stack. If a card is out of square you are experiencing "blade draw". The lamination may be too much for the force of the blade or the blade may need sharpening.

 

[keith1]

Assuming clamp pressure is correct and you're not trying to cut too many at once, my bet would be either the knife needs sharpening or the adjusting bolts, or what they're attached to, is worn. You may need to bring in a machinist.

 

[Craig]

Smaller lifts and a Sharp blade. The lamination will dull the blade faster as well.

 

[B.Vespa]

They seem to me square. The first cut it always square. After some digging I have learned that when making the final cuts on business cards, I should have stacks on each end of the blade for better clamping. Duh haha

One more thing to check. When you are cutting multiple stacks at the same time, they must have exactly the same number of sheets. Otherwise, the stacks with less sheets will draw from lack of pressure. I have seen this mistake before with new cutter operators.