My plotter cutter blade snapped mid-job and totally changed how I set up files now

was cutting vinyl for a client's storefront window last Wednesday and right at the halfway point my 45 degree blade just snapped clean off. heard a ping and the carriage stopped moving. turns out I had been running too many cut passes on thick material without checking the blade depth. now I always do a test cut on a scrap piece first and keep 3 backup blades in my drawer. anyone else have a tool failure that made you slow down and double check your settings?

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1 Comment

theawest2h ago

Your test cut idea is good but you still gotta check blade depth too. I had a similar thing happen with my machine but the blade actually just got dull from running through cheap vinyl that had grit in it. Now I always run a quick depth check before any job even if I'm in a hurry. Keeping backups is smart but also maybe look into getting a different brand of blades if they keep snapping on you. I switched to the ones with the thicker shaft and they last way longer.

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