bylinesupplyco Report post Posted July 1, 2015 I recently purchased a Harbor Freight shop press into a leather clicker by having someone weld cold rolled steel plates to the jack press bar and the base bar. Excited to use it once I get dies made. What is the easiest way to go about designing the dies with the exact sizing specifications? I have Illustrator experience, however it is difficult to set the exact length of a line in inches, along with the exact curve of rounded corners on designs. The die company I am going through is requesting an illustrator file. Help please! Quote Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
King's X Report post Posted July 1, 2015 Poster board, ruler and a pen. I do several mock up before I sent it off to the maker. Good luck and welcome to the clicker family. Quote Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
veedub3 Report post Posted July 1, 2015 Have you checked out Youtube? They have several videos on how to draw a straight line and how to draw curves in Illustrator, and many, many more helpful videos on Illustrator. Sorry I can't help ya, my software of choice is CorelDraw. Karina Quote Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
bylinesupplyco Report post Posted July 1, 2015 I know how to draw in illustrator, my question is more to geared toward how to set the exact length in inches for the curves and lines i draw. Quote Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
JLSleather Report post Posted July 1, 2015 That gal at texas custom dies says they'll use an .ai, .dwg, .dxf, .pdf and a couple others. FWIW Quote Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
SteelheadFineGoods Report post Posted July 2, 2015 Texas Custom Dies also accepts thick card stock paper cut outs of your shape and they can create a very accurate die from that. Quote Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
King's X Report post Posted July 2, 2015 Cut Rite Dies and Texas Custom Dies both will accept poster board templates. Quote Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
DavidL Report post Posted July 6, 2015 in illustrator I click and a box will come out asking for the length of the line, from there i type in "10 cm" and it will change that to pixels or whatever measurement is default. texas custom dies automatically creates curved edges, unless told otherwise. Quote Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Art Report post Posted July 6, 2015 I'm afraid I am way old school on this subject. Make your patterns out of posterboard. It is easy to correct and adjust with scissors and tape. If your die-maker can't take patterns on posterboard, find another die-maker. I really want the experience of an old-school die-maker to make-up what I need, not necessarily a machine. If you send a real die-maker something whacky you're going to get a phone call. If you send something whacky to a computerized shop, you are going to get something whacky back. Heather at Texas Custom Dies can help with anything die wise, and the dies are heavy and well made. Art Quote Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
JLSleather Report post Posted July 6, 2015 texas custom dies automatically creates curved edges, unless told otherwise. What does this mean? What curved edges? Quote Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
DavidL Report post Posted July 6, 2015 curved edges doesnt make sense.. curved corner is what I meant to write. Quote Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
JLSleather Report post Posted July 7, 2015 Oh, yeah - right you are. Corners will have a radius unless you request a sharp corner. Quote Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
semperdesigns Report post Posted July 8, 2015 With regards to creating a precise shape digitally, I find AutoCAD to be way more precise. It is quite easy to get an educational license, even if not a student. AutoCAD is far more precise than illustrator is, and I find it far easier to work with. Other CAD software (some free I'm sure) will be the same way. The question then becomes getting that drawing to illustrator. What I do is put a bounding box of a known dimension around my CAD drawing. Then I export this as a dxf from auto cad. Open the dxf in Illustrator. Now create an artboard (shift-O, CS6 or later) of the same size as your bounding box. Resize the entire drawing so that the bounding box snaps to the artboard. This eliminates scale issues. Now save in whatever format the die company wanted. Quote Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
King's X Report post Posted July 8, 2015 I just sent a template out of poster board to a die company. I am trying a new company Milwaukee Steel Rule Dies. According to what I have read, nothing should change....it should turn out perfect or close to it. Quote Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Nuttish Report post Posted July 9, 2015 Sorry, but you need to learn how to actually use Illustrator if you seriously believe that CAD software is more " precise" or that your workflow is efficient. Quote Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
JLSleather Report post Posted July 9, 2015 Sorry, but you need to learn how to actually use Illustrator if you seriously believe that CAD software is more " precise" or that your workflow is efficient. Well, until now I hadn't said it, but I wondered how it was "efficient" to draw in one program and then transfer to another? Quote Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
semperdesigns Report post Posted July 9, 2015 Illustrator might be precise enough for the leather work that we do. It is capable, so by all means, use it. But AutoCAD is objectively more precise. Down to five decimal points of any unit, if I recall correctly. It's why you simply won't see engineers and architects using illustrator. In some of the work I do - CNC, manufacturing drawings, and architecture, Illustrator just won't cut it. Depending on the drawing It's also, at least for me, far quicker to draw in AutoCAD. If it's a simple pattern, I might just start in Illustrator if that's the end format I need. But if I need an extremely precise drawing and it's complex, it will be far faster for me to start in AutoCAD, and move over to Illustrator later for colour fills and other things it's better at. Which brings me to: different software excel at different things. No one balks at moving in between photoshop (raster) and illustrator (vector). And you likewise shouldn't be afraid to move between Illustrator (illustration), and CAD (drafting). If you haven't tried AutoCAD yet, I encourage you to. Certain operations are unwieldy at best in Illustrator like arcs, offsetting lines, dimensioning, and until recently rounded corners. These are extremely easy in CAD software. Back to the point though! In the case of this project, CAD software is unnecessary - dies don't need microns of precision. But, bylinesupplyco was having trouble doing the pattern in Illustrator so I simply I thought I'd mention AutoCAD as it is more purpose built for drafting, and might be easier for them to learn for that purpose. Quote Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
JLSleather Report post Posted July 12, 2015 decimal points of any unit, if I recall correctly. It's why you simply won't see engineers and architects using illustrator. In some of the work I do - CNC, manufacturing drawings, and architecture, Illustrator just won't cut it. Depending on the drawing It's also, at least for me, far quicker to draw in AutoCAD. If it's a simple pattern, I used to know a little AutoCad. Maybe you could show us some of what you mean? Quote Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
semperdesigns Report post Posted July 12, 2015 (edited) Yeah for sure! It's tough with being in front of the software with you, but AutoCAD is completely command based, so I'll let you know the ones I use the most. l - line a - arc c - circle sp - spline - similar to pen tool with beziers in illustrator. Those are obvious, of course. Hit the command, then hit the length, radius, etc that you want. The interface will guide you through each step. Then for editing: tr - trim - trims one line to where another crosses it - really useful for fast drafting. ex- extend - opposite of trim - extends one line to another o - offset - offsets a line a specified distance away f - fillet - rounds a corner to a specified radius And for moving co - copy m - move ro - rotate. So, everything is pretty self explanatory, and just requires some practice. Other things I would note: - Dragging to select works differently if you drag a selection box leftward (selects everything contained by box) and rightward (everything touched and contained). - hitting spacebar repeats last command - hold down middle scroll wheel on mouse to pan, use scroll wheel to zoom. - use the command re to regenerate. Sometimes if you zoom way out, then back in, curves will appear jagged. Use re to get them back to normal. Hope that all made sense, and good luck! Edited July 12, 2015 by semperdesigns Quote Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
JLSleather Report post Posted July 12, 2015 Oh, I meant maybe you had a design you did in AC and morphed (or translated, or copied, or exported, or used the force) into .ai like they were talking about. Don't worry about it. Purdy much what I expected. Quote Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
10FiftyFive Report post Posted July 16, 2015 I know I'm new here, but Illustrator and CAD are both vector based, neither are inherently more accurate than the other, the fact that you can losslessly transition between the two is testament to that. True, by default Illustrator will display lengths only down to 1/10,000th of an inch, but you could also change your units and drop it to 1/10000th of a mm, or go even smaller down to 1/10000th of a point (0.00000013") That's probably more accurate than your monitor could display anyways. Does anything here really need to be more accurate than that? All of those 'quick' things you mentioned for autocad are just as simple, if not more powerful in Illustrator. If you're engineering, by all means, use an engineering tool. If you're designing, you should probably use a design tool. (I may be a bit defensive of Illustrator) Quote Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
tossik Report post Posted July 16, 2015 What would be a good company to use for dies? Who is the most popular and affordable? Quote Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
