hi colin, thx alot for your video and webpage... that helped me alot to get into the entire stuff... i finally got it to run on a cameo v2 with v1.6 firmware on w10. was quite a fight to get this to run. for other ppl... maybe some hits for problems i was fighting with: 1) printer only shows up as USB-Printer Support device. unforunately this device can't be shared. seems that's normal. fix: -to share it you need to go to the devices and printers panel from windows -add printer -following window press "the printer is not in the list" -select local or networt printer -select existing printer -select in the popup USB00* virtual printer. maybe there are more than one you have to try out which is the right -select the printer driver -use installed driver -give it a name -share printer and give it a name. this is what you enter into gerber2graphtec in combination with your computername. unforunately my windows is in german so i don't know the 100% names for the window items... 2) gerber2graphtec problem it does not work to create the result.txt really use the versions colin wrote on the webpage. i used for example ghostscript 9.5 which didn't work. 3) printing from gerber2graphtec does not work. if you press send to printer nothing happens. if you have a look to the printer queue the document is listed but the printer does not start to print. fix: this seems to be a wrong setup in the gpgl result.txt from graphtec.py. i used a usb sniffer to see what silhouette studio sends to the printer. saved this to a file and used this as result.txt and send it via gerber2graphtec. this worked fine. so it must be something which gerber2graphtec does what is wrong for the cameo 2. so i investigated a bit and kicked all stuff out from graphtec.py which was not in the created gpgl which was done with silhouette studio. beside this the gui creates a return in the result.txt for speed setting (not sure if this is a problem) and? it works now. if someone needs my patched graphtec.py tell me. really important is that only send if the printer queue is empty to do so delete the queue. sometimes one printjob can't be deleted. to reset unplug the printer from usb. 4) printer is not recognised in silhouette studio. fix: this is really odd... maybe a driver problem. -disconnect power and usb from the printer -start silhouette studio -goto send -printer is not found of course -connect power and switch the printer on -wait a while then connect usb to the printer this worked for me ...mostly ;) it's from the silhouette webpage... but i'm really impressed. never thought that cutter can cutout 0,5 pitch ics... niceness

I followed everything to the T. It works wonderfull. I use the V2 Cameo Cutter and I cannot believe how good it's working. We do not have Mylar / Drafting Film paper in South Africa, but I used overhead projector paper for ink-jet printers and the result is stunning. The cutter may be a bit slower but I have nothing to compare it with. The result is 100% clean. I have measured the thickness of the paper to be 0.12mm. Still clean.

@ColinOFlynn

8 жыл бұрын

Great to know - did you have problems with the V2? A while back someone had trouble with it, but maybe newer firmware fixed that issue. Anyway it is absolutely amazing how well this thing works for what is assumed to be a silly scrapbooking machine ;-)

@neelsgroenewald11

8 жыл бұрын

No problem at all..... I did download new firmware and update the cutter. I'm going to try 0.14mm Acetate Sheet. A bit thicker than your 3mil but I need that extra solder paste on some heavy duty components. Nobody believes me if I tell what I have learnt from the web. I will one day tell my story and what I have done with the information gained. Thanks again.

How many times can you use one sheet in the PCBs?

Can we scan stencil aperture to produce R274 format data(Gerber data format? The data will compare to Gerber to buy off stencil.

Who knows the compatibility of gerber2graphtec with Cameo3 or Curio?

What do you think about the cricut explore vs the cameo?

I'm looking to make flexible pcb by using the Cameo hobby cutter, much as you did with the stencil. Where do you get the drivers that make the Cameo appear as a plotter/printer in Widows? You reference that at 7:58 in your video above, but I did not find the zip file you reference in your Github repository.

Hello Colin, Thanx, My method differs a little. 1- FRom EAGLE I export pcb layout to A black and white .pdf file. 2- Convert it to img 1:1 3- Import and cut on Cameo.

Hi, Thank you for the tutorial Colin. I have the Silhouette Curio and whenever I click send to Silhouette in the app you made... nothing happens. after trying for many times now I can only cut the borders specified in tha app but not the board itself!!!! had such issue before ?

@ColinOFlynn

7 жыл бұрын

Huh - not sure! The app was something I just modified a bit, so not sure on the inner workings... I'd try a different Gerber, I did see problems like that when it couldn't process the gerber very well.

@ColinOFlynn

7 жыл бұрын

Tried to respond and comment doesn't seem to be appearing, so sorry if you get two of these. But anyway I'm not sure off-hand, I had seen some issues for certain gerbers the Silhoutte just didn't seem to like. I never figured out why - maybe try a different gerber (possibly from different software). Might be a setting on the gerber export?

Where is the soldering from this stencil???

Hi Colin, This is Wagner. I Have a Silhouette portrait, it's a little smaller, but I have a problem. when I make a big PCB the Silhouette of cut is not exactly to PCB. It happens with the Silhouette Cameo?? Thanks for help me. PS. So sorry, my English writing is too bad. thanks

@ColinOFlynn

9 жыл бұрын

Wagner Wavah Is there a bit of a scale issue or what does it look like? I haven't seen that problem!

@wavahsilva

9 жыл бұрын

thanks Colin. Firts I started to make the stencil like you later I changed the transparency by beer tin alumminiun. The process is same or almost same. I think to do a little movie about this.

@ColinOFlynn

9 жыл бұрын

Wagner Wavah Cool - let me know would be curious to see it working with that!

@justrandom7214

8 жыл бұрын

How long does the blade work when cutting aluminum?

@ColinOFlynn

8 жыл бұрын

Haven't tried it with aluminum, have only used that mylar material. I assume some thin foil would cause a lot more wear than the mylar...

Cool. Thanks for the info. FYI your Amazon link is broken. I don't know if you were trying to create an affiliate link so I won't post a regular link here. Don't worry that you missed an affiliate program op or whatnot. I am not serious enough about this for a $200 machine as I am just working on my first project to send to a board house right now...so not yet anyways. I just went to check the price out of curiosity and noticed the link ;) I don't see how this is different than a typical plotter though, although I've never owned a plotter myself and only used someone else's a handful of times. Thanks for the upload and references, -Jake

Please, can you tell me exactly what kind of film have you used? Thickness (in millimeters) and material? Thank you! (is it this? www.deserres.ca/en/gdrawf )

Really nice. Thanks. What does the border setting do?

@ColinOFlynn

8 жыл бұрын

+Yau Garba To be honest... I don't know fully, my assumption was it defines how far out the 'border' of the piece is cut (i.e. how much extra material you get), but it doesn't always seem to correlate to set values.

@abuman05

8 жыл бұрын

+Colin O'Flynn Thanks for the response. I figured it out experimenting and you're right. It cuts what is specified as border (inches) from the bounding box of the gerber.

@ColinOFlynn

8 жыл бұрын

Alright great - I remember my issue was some of my gerbers had their own border already, so the system would cut by that (closer) border. I ended up getting a gerber editor to fix that.

@SteveCiciora

4 жыл бұрын

@@ColinOFlynn What gerber editor do you use? Thanks!

FYI, the GitHub link in step 4 is incorrect. It should be github.com/colinoflynn/gerber2graphtec

Has anyone tried this process with DXF format? The (free, EXPRESSPCB.COM) PC board layout S/W I use doesn't make the Gerber files available to the end user, they are proprietary to the vendor but they do generate a dxf to scale that has all the detail needed to produce a stencil.

@ColinOFlynn

7 жыл бұрын

You might be able to remake the gerber-->stencil instruction commands. In theory it's a similar idea, but would need some work on your side I imagine. Or see if there is something that can import DXF, then export a gerber file (other PCB software for example, or a gerber editor software).

@kaydee457

7 жыл бұрын

I guess I'm going to find out shortly given I just bought a machine on ebay....The machine itself lists DXF file compatibility. That would be the easiest thing to try first.

@ColinOFlynn

7 жыл бұрын

Huh - it may in fact be using DXF then for the gerber cutting! The printed gets mounted as a shared printer is all I know, and the software prints via the 'network share' (even if it's local). I tried to not learn too much about what happens behind the scenes ;-)

@kaydee457

7 жыл бұрын

edit- The Silhouette Designer supports these file types: .png, .jpeg, .bmp, .gif .tiff, .gsd, .dxf, .svg. I thought I would have to upgrade but the stock program works fine to open a .dxf. I just downloaded it and opened a dxf.

@PanFlute68

7 жыл бұрын

I've opened a DXF directly in the Silhouette Designer and had great success making stencils. The DXF exporter used the right units so all I needed to do was import the DXF, duplicate it a couple times, put a border around each to cut out mulitple copies on a single page and then cut. The hardest part of the process was adjusting the cut speed and depth for a new material I never used before.

Thanks for the video, but please get a cameraman next time :)