KLIC-N-KUT KNK Force, User Manual

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6.10 Stenciling Letters
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When creating a stencil, you keep the
“waste” or “negative” of a cut. When using regular fonts, such as
Arial, some of the letters, such as a “B”, “a”, and “e”, will not work because they have interior paths called
child shapes. Those child shapes are not connected to the waste portion of the material and will be lost from
the stencil as shown below. The red arrows indicate the child shapes inside parent shapes for the letters
“B”,”a”, and “e”:
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To avoid this, a procedure called stenciling can be used to connect the area outside of the letters to the child
shapes, essentially eliminating them. There is a feature on the
Tools Panel called the Stencil Bridge which
can be used to connect the interior parts to the surrounding area.
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Before using this function, select the text and go to Object>Ungroup . Failure to do this can cause
distortion of other letters as the stencil function is applied. Then click on the Stencil Bridge icon .
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Zoom in close on the lettering so that you’ll be able to see exactly where you need to connect. Click on the
Stencil Bridge icon and, in the Tools Options at the top, a setting for the width or thickness of the bridge
can be set:
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The Size you enter will normally relate to the height and style of the lettering you are stenciling. In this
example, the na
me “Teddy” was typed at a height of ~1 inch. The
Stencil bridge size is set at 0.10, but it
could be smaller or larger depending on your personal preference. Before applying, you can drag the mouse
in an empty area of the screen to see the size that will be used and adjust accordingly:
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Before applying, hide the outside rectangle, so that it’s not affected. You can now drag the mouse across a
letter to create a bridge. Hold down the
Shift key, while dragging, and the bridge will be either perfectly
vertical or perfectly horizontal:
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Repeat the process with the other letters containing child shapes:
Enter the Size (thickness) to use
After cutting and lifting the
stencil from the mat, the interior
parts of the “e” and the “d’s will
be cut away.
Stencil bridge size = 0.10 in Stencil bridge size = 0.05 in
Size is a bit too large Size is better suited based on
letter sizing
Hold Shift and drag through
the top part of the “e”
The interior part of the
“e” is now bridged