Sign Making

[bobreda]

Just got thee machine recently and started playing with it. I would like to know from all you experienced sign makers what the best fonts are for signmaking with the 60 or 90^ bit. Also, what is the best size for the lettering?? I've been playing around, but all the wood I have been using is small. I can't seem to download any other fonts other than that is in the design software, I know that this subject was discussed before but I can't seem to find the response to it.

Thanks
Bob

[ditchdoc]

I have used the font called times new roman from the program library. Letters smaller than about an inch in height don't do real well because of the depth required during the carving, to get the letter shape. This sometimes causes one letter to be carved into another. Anything larger works and looks good. I have had best success on woods with closed grain, and harder woods carve more cleanly. Cherry is on that works well, as does African mahogany and walnut. Walnut veneer MDF looks good too. Hope this helps some. Ditch

[pkunk]

Try New York with the 60° bit for small letters in centerline. I understood it used any font on your computer-that they wern't native to the designer software. Play around on some scrap wood.

[David M.]

I've been testing just what your looking for but so far have found that the machince is not that good at the centerline cutting, yet. I have tested several fonts and have found IF the cut is poor, the size doesn't really matter, it will be poor at .5 - 1" - 1.5" etc., the algorithm is the problem, Chris said it is and issue they are working on and may rewrite the algorithm themselves.

The centerline fonts need to be tested one by one and bit by bit unfortinatly. surprisingly the more wild the font the better the results I've had. The machine has a hard time making a straight lines or curves with the fonts because they seem to have a lot of extra points. Rather than a line consisting of a path between two points, they appear to have several extras and the machine tracks from point to point leaving slight jogs and waves in the line, which is very noticable. Almost like the machine doing a dot to dot. It looks like the fonts need to be cleaned up and points minimized to the bear minimum needed. I've only done 6 or 8 fonts but plan to go one by one and take notes.

The raster carving of text is very good and I have had very good results consistantly with this. It is slower but does a great job with limited to no chipout so far. This is were the machine is at it's best. I'm sure given time the centerline will be up to par.

[David M.]

Here is one of my test boards it is 1" text with a 90* v-bit, it is on a 7.5 x 20.5" board, it took around 20 minutes I think. The board was edge routed after the fact to test the free satnding feature of the machine (from the control pad) added to the overall time.

[David M.]

2nd view

[David M.]

Here is arial in a .25" bull nose and a 90* v-bit, largests size is 2" smallest size is .25", the same flaws show reguardless of size, this shows my point above.

[bobreda]

Thanks for all the replys guys. Dave, nice tutorial of the lettering. How deep do you carve the letters with the 60^90^ bit? Also, how do you get different fonts that are not in the design hardware?

[David M.]

I haven't tryed to bring any other fonts in but I do believe it's possible. Not sure if you add the true type font to your windows font list or one within the CW software.

The depth of the cut with the centerline text is not something you can adjust, the software seems to adjust according to the font. On my board with the verous fonts the average is around .125, but in the center font is as much as a .25".

[pkunk]

[quote="David M."]I haven't tryed to bring any other fonts in but I do believe it's possible. Not sure if you add the true type font to your windows font list or one within the CW software.

The depth of the cut with the centerline text is not something you can adjust, the software seems to adjust according to the font. On my board with the verous fonts the average is around .125, but in the center font is as much as a .25".[/quote

As I said in my post above, I was told the fonts are on your computer's font library, not in the software. With the 60° bit, depth is a factor of the font and by nature, 'bold' is deeper than normal. Here's new york.....

[bobreda]

There are fonts on my computer that are not on the design hardware. I can't find the New York font anywhere. I've tried looking for it on the net and can't find it.

Bob

[David M.]

You need to look for the font by the style of letter, outside windows the name will likly be different. To use TRUE TYPE fonts software designers have to pay a royalty, if the designer use the fonts and changes the title of the fonts they can be used without royalty. Two differant computers and makers ALWAYS have different font lists. I've been running into this issue for 20 years in the sign business. I'll bet right now you have 3 different design progams with the same font, with 3 differant names. Only windows and a couple of other programs major progams will bother to pay the royalty everyone else changes the names and goes on, Corel, Adobe, etc. all do this, everything is the same but the name.

They will be similar but different, like "american" becomes "Americana", 10% change brakes a copy right.