To celebrate the Evolution3 SmartFold winning the Printing United Alliance Pinnacle product award, we asked our Technical Director, Andy Roberts, to give us an insight into his development of the Keencut Evolution3.
Andy has worked on all our market-leading machines, including the Sabre, Simplex, and SteelTrak. His knowledge and expertise are why the Evolution3 is such a revolutionary step forward in cutter design.
Andy’s design brief for the Evolution3 asked extremely challenging questions. Our Evolution Series 2 remained popular and was still the best benchtop cutter on the market and the only one with guaranteed accuracy; no one had matched the performance or accuracy. However, the form and even the style of the Evolution Series 2 had been copied and Andy felt that certain areas could be improved. Andy has agreed to give us an insight into his design journey, and we have presented this as three short videos entitled ‘Ask the Designer.’
Why design a new cutter bar?
Andy explained that Keencut designers constantly strive to create the perfect cutting solution “that’s why we remain market leaders!”
He related how the team set about solving three key challenges:
- Engineering the perfectly flat horizontal clamping bar with no sag, even on a 5.1 m long cutter.
- Designing a manual cutter bar with simple, fast and accurate alignment that could be operated by one person.
- Designing a cutter bar that could be easily upgraded when a customer wanted to cut a different type of material.
Andy and his design team exceeded our expectations. They created a revolutionary manual cutting solution that was futureproofed, had no sag, and not only offered single-handed operation but had a clamping system that could be adjusted using one finger!
We hope that you enjoy gaining an insight into our design process and the work that underpins Keencut’s reputation as manufacturers of the finest cutting machines in the world.
Episode 1 – Engineering the perfectly flat horizontal clamping bar – The Evolution3
In this video, Andy explains how the team removed any sag on the bar to overcome parallax errors and ensure perfect alignment. The Keencut Evolution3 anti-sag mechanism means the cutter bar can be suspended exactly parallel to the media surface over the cutter’s whole length with zero sag, even on the longest 5.1m sized cutter. Users can quickly and easily adjust the Evolution3 for sag to guarantee a perfect cut, even on lightweight materials such as pop-up banners. This clever innovation means that one person can operate the Keencut Evolution3.
To find out more about the Evolution3 range click HERE
Episode 2: Designing for single-handed, fast and accurate alignment – the Lift-and-Hover system
One of the main criteria for the Keencut Evolution3 was to create a manual benchtop cutter that could be precisely aligned and operated by one person. In this video, Andy explains how the team met the challenge of creating a braking system that offered fingertip adjustment for lowering and raising the bar. The Keencut Evolution3 hovers just millimetres above the material so that fine adjustments can be made to align the cut with the sightline stip. The Lift-and-Hover technology means that one person can precisely align materials to ensure the perfect cut every time.
Episode 3: Future-proofing cutter bar design – the QuikSwap tool heads
The Keencut Evolution3 cutter bar has been designed so that users do not have to purchase a new machine when they work with different materials or new materials come to the market. We wanted to create a flexible Keencut machine that could adapt to changing needs. Andy explains how our design team created a series of Keencut QuikSwap tool heads that can be quickly added to the Evolution3. Each tool is designed for a specific purpose, such as general cutting, creasing and fabric cutting and can be attached or detached from the cutter in seconds. You can mount single or multiple tool heads to suit your work. The Evolution3 Graphik tool head is supplied as standard, with other optional QuikSwap tool heads available to extend your cutting capability.
To find out more about the Evolution3 range click HERE
