Skinny Cards (Under 2”)
I have a Challenge Cutter, which has a minimum cut size of 2”. Any less, and the back guard would interfere with the clamp.
The problem is that people want skinny business cards, or 1” strips for belly bands and such. We have a hand cutter that does the trick, but it’s nowhere near as precise as the Challenge.
Does anyone have any tricks for getting around this? I have envisioned a foam block that would fit behind the stock, and compress with the clamp. But that seems kind of wacky.
I would appreciate anyone’s insight!
One way to get thinner strips is to have your final cut on the OUTSIDE of the blade. If you wanted a 1” strip off of a 5” original, simply set the deoth at 4” and the cutter will give you your desired 1” in what would normally be the trim.
American Printing Equipment used to sell something for just this purpose, though I doubt it still available. The item, used in pairs on larger sheets, had two metal pieces hinged in the middle with a spring that pushed them into an X shape. You jogged the paper against them, but as the clamp was lowered, the arms closed. You just had to have a thicker stack of paper than the closed thickness of the thing. APE called it a paper cutter back gauge. Note that it would compress downward but not outward, which foam probably would do.
Or, you could print the cards on an oversize sheet and cut them with the card on the outside of the cut. Say it’s a 1.5 inch depth, and you can cut 2 inches, print a 3.5 inch sheet and cut it to 2 inches. Cut edge may be dusty or burred, but it’d work.
Are you sure your cutter does not have a false plate on the clamp? If it does, it can easily be removed from the back of the clamp. With the plate removed I can cut strips .75” wide on my Challenge.
Sumner
Sumner wins!
False plate removed, this thing is slicing deli meats. I can’t believe I didn’t think of that. Wow. What a versatile machine.
The backgauge is designed to nook right into the grooves of the clamp.
Parallel, it’s good to know that someone else thought of such a contrivance. That sounds like a neat device. I can’t imagine it worked very well, but it sounds cool.
Thank you, everyone, for your help.
We just use cut offs or a previously cut stack behind the last cut. Our cutter is 42” and to much work to take the false clamp on and off for the amount of times in a day we would need to do it.