Mountcutter Bevel Conundrum

[RobM]

I'm being greedy with the appeals for knowledge this morning.

My latest problem involves cutting 4 equal-sized windows into a mount. See first photo.

It's not a particularly large mount, at only 370x280mm overall. However, due to the limitations of the "top" bar of the Ultimate Futura bevel cut, I cannot work on a dim of more than 180mm (see second photo), when I really need to start with a specific cut at 205mm from that orientation (see third photo).

The outcome was that I thought I would just work from the "side" bar and cut back, but this has resulted in the bevel slope coming out on the wrong side (schoolboy error! - also visible on photo 3).

Bearing in mind many of you must do these sorts of mounts with far greater dims, how do you get around this?

Thanks again.

[pramsay13]

When I first started cutting multi-aperture mounts I would draw the openings on the back of the mountboard. I would also scribble the cutting direction and scrap pieces to keep me right.

For the bits you can't reach with the top scale simply set it to 0 and start cutting from your drawn line on the back of the mountboard.

[RobM]

This is very useful, thanks Peter. You've actually reminded me that I was advised the same thing (about putting directions on) when I was initially trained in this and had forgotten. It does tend to help the more we mark on the back of the sheet.

Great, appreciate that, matey.

[JKX]

Do you own a manual for this and have you ever read it?

This is in there

Did you watch the videos recommended in this post on one of your previous threads?

..

This is covered there!

[RobM]

Yeah, I've read the manual.

I've also watched some of those videos and find them to be a bit useless. There are no close-up shots of the very details that need to be looked at, rendering them a bit pointless, in my opinion.

[JKX]

OK, well I can understand how you want to set stops and the margin guide as much as you can, rather than have to eyeball start and end of cuts, and margins.

Although it's not really practicable to try and set the stops/margin guide for each and every cut, you can set one and eyeball one for every cut, plus use the margin guide for every outside cut.

As has been mentiomed, for the start of cuts that you do not set the stop for, set it to zero and start the cut when the stop is at your drawn line, it takes a bit of practice to not over or undercut. Then for the end of cuts you have to eyeball, the blade housing has an engraved line, when that hits your marked line, stop! Practice, again.

I'll try and describe how I did multi apertures like this. Firstly you do not need to draw the outer margin lines, you only need to draw the big cross in the centre, but to start with, draw that outer margin, so that you can see how close to the cutter bar it is when the margin guide is set. Use that for reference on the "cross" lines.



Set your margin guide, set your start of cut stop, make the top left cut, eyeball the end of cut.
Turn the board through 90 degrees, repeat, repeat, repeat.
Now set your END of cut stop and set the start of cut stop to zero.
Make The bottom left cut eyeballing the start of cut.
Turn board throgh 90 degrees, repeat, repeat, repeat.

Remove the margin guide.

Set the cutter bar to the right hand centre "cross" line, your end of cut stop is already set,
Make the bottom right cut, eyeball the start of cut, cut.
Turn board through 90 degrees, repeat, repeat, repeat.
Set the start of cut stop and make the top right cut, eyeballing the end of cut,
Turn board throgh 90 degrees, cut. Repeat, repeat, repeat.

This is the best bit, don't use the usual narrow slip mat, use one the same size, or slightly bigger, than your mount.
As long as your blade is set to the correct depth - ie, you're not going to wreck it, this could be your undermount, just don't put that side against artwork. Turn slip mat and mount together. This prevents the fall outs from dangling about.

Hope that all makes sense!


BTW, bring those apertures in, so the outer margins are wider than the inner ones.

[RobM]

A very thorough and detailed outline there, thanks John!

I've read through it a couple of times, but really need to do so as I practice some cuts, so that I can properly cross-reference - which I will do next week.

So, it seems from both yours and Peter's response, that there is essentially more reliance on drawn lines on the back of the mount when doing multiple windows...and I've just got to get used to ensuring the blades cuts through the mount at the right intersections. As you say, sounds like something I need to practice a lot until it becomes normal.

That is a useful point about the engraving on the blade.

I'm going to practice this more next week, but I appreciate your lengthy response.

Thanks again.