Sand Blasting With the Vinyl Cutter
I have had plenty of previous experience with the vinyl cutter. For this week's vinyl project, I decided to use the vinyl cutter and the sand blaster to create a team number plate for my FTC team.

Design
To create my design, I used Gimp's text tool to type my team number and re-size it so that it is legal to be used on the robot as a team number (3 inches high, 1/2 inch wide strokes) if I decided to use it as such in the future. I then exported it to a PNG file. Nothing fancy.

Cutting Process
First, I imported the PNG file into Adobe Illustrator. In AI, I changed the size of the artboard to fit my image. I then moved the image into the artboard and selected it. In the toolbar, there is an option to trace the image. I used this option to create vectors that the cutter can use when the trace result is shown.

Then I used AI's print dialouge and the printer properties function (to set the cutter up) to send the file to the cutter. To set the cutter up, I choose a color of vinyl (preferably dark, the cuts show up better), load it and set the rollers, select ROLL when prompted on the cutter screen, and move back to the computer to have AI read the witdh value from the cutter. I click print and the cutter then cuts out the sticker. Shown below is the cutter cutting out the sticker.

I placed the sticker on a sheet of aluminum that I had previously cut out on the scroll saw. I didn't cut the sheet to any particular size, just in half relative to the rest of the original sheet. I then covered up the open spaces with excess vinyl the FabLab had for that purpose. I placed the piece in the sand blaster.

I turned the air compressor on, since the sand blaster uses compressed air to propel the abrasive. After turning the filter on, I uses the gloves to maipulate the sand blaster gun and move the spray side to side across the piece, ensuring an even coat. This is what the piece looked like after the sand blasting, with and without the vinyl.

Steven later trimmed the rough edge and created a stand for it. The piece was used at the Alaska FTC state championship to help promote our popcorn stand.

Files:
Sticker design. Right click > Save