FAQ
ProSail Plotter MkIII
How much does the Plotter MkIII cost?
Current price is 4,300 Euro for the 1.5m x 7.2m machine. This includes the nesting software plus either: ProSail 3D Sail design or ProSail 2D PanelMaker.
What are the advantages of using a plotter, over templates and plotting by hand?
In a nutshell, efficiency, reproducible accurate and fast plotting, while reducing fabric waste.
The plotter can be quickly lifted off the rail and stored, allowing the floor or table space to be used for other operations.
Once all your patterns and templates have been loaded into the computer, they can be permanently stored on disk, eliminating the need to keep and store piles of physical patterns.
Patterns can be quickly and easily modified and saved as a new file.
The same pattern can be repeated thousands of times without degradation.
Patterns are consistently and accurately drawn to 0.2 of a millimetre.
A customer can email through a pattern file which can be loaded into the nesting software and immediately plotted with just a couple of clicks of the mouse.
Fabric stretch particularly in large panels can be easily compensated for by shrinking a given percentage before plotting. before plotting
Does the plotter need to be mounted on a table?
It can be run on a table but a lot of our customers attach the single guide rail to the floor near a wall. Because the plotter is detachable, the floor area is recovered when the plotter is not in use.
What sort of pen does the plotter use?
To keep operating costs to a minimum, any commercially available pen or marker can be used providing its diameter is no bigger than 13mm.
Other than industrial textiles and fabric, what other materials can your plotter be used on?
The MkIII plotter is ideally suited to to be used on sheet steel, plywood, aluminium, plastic, cardboard paper or just about any flat panel or sheet material.
What is the delivery time?
Custom machines are generally ready for delivery within two weeks. Allow another week for shipping by DHL courier.
What is the cost of delivery?
Plotters cost on average around 200 - 300 Euros to almost anywhere in the world.
ProSail 2D digitiser
Can my Mklll plotter be used to Digitise?
No. The digitiser is a completely different machine. Externally the Digitiser looks similar and is able to share the same guide rail and even power and data cables but internally it is quite different.
How does the digitiser work?
The movable head on the Y axis carries a laser pointer. When the laser is manually lined up with a corner or curve on the pattern being traced a button is pressed and that point is saved. One click saves a corner or point, two clicks denotes the start middle or end of a curve.
ProSail Plotter/Cutter Mklll
How much does a Plotter/Cutter Mklll cost?
Currently the Mklll Plotter/Cutter costs 13,600 Euros.
What length can the table be?
Our standard table length is 10 metres but this can be as short or as long as you need. We have customers with tables over 30 metres long!
And the width of the table?
Our machines are custom made so the plottable width is up to the customer. Fabric comes in standard widths, sail cloth for example is normally under 1500mm wide. Our machines range from 1500mm to over 4 metres plottable.
How is the fabric held down on the table?
Most of our customers use a vacuum table which is often built out of their existing cutting table. We supply plans for these.
What is the cutting surface of the table made of?
Table surfaces are fitted with 3mm PVC sacrificial plastic which is an affordable readily available plastic. The cutting blade cuts in to this surface as it rolls ensuring a clean precise cut.
How long does it take to install a machine?
It normally takes less than a day.
What cutting blade does the Mklll Plotter/Cutters use?
Like the pens and markers, to keep operating costs low, our plotter/cutter uses a standard commercially available 28mm roller cutting blade (pizza cutter). Depending on the material being cut, they can last thousands of metres although some materials (Kevlar for example) will blunt a blade quite quickly.
How fast can the Mklll Plotter/Cutter draw and cut fabric?
The maximum cut and mark speed for the MkIII is 1.2 metres per second.
What is the delivery time?
Custom machines are generally ready for delivery within two weeks. Allow another week for air-freight.
What is the cost of shipping?
Plotter/Cutters cost on average 600 Euros to air-freight almost anywhere in the world.