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New lasercut kits?


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Am I the only one itching to see some of our favorites re-released as laser cut kits? Now that I have worked with two (the Jefferson and the Spring Fling), I can't see myself working on a kit that isn't and I have been dying to make a McKinley or Willowcrest! When are more laser-cut kits coming out?

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I know how you feel. I'm dieing for them to release the Beacon Hill or the Garfield in 1/2 scale and laser cut too. I do not have the room for one of those in full scale but absolutley love them. Oooohh or the Lily in laser cut full scale I probably have room for that one. I think it would cause a large boost in sales as laser cut is soooo much easier to handle and getting everything together goes so smoothly.

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I'm new to all this. Could someone explain the difference between laser cut and .... well whatever else there is? I'm not even sure which my Buttercup kit would be. There doesn't seem to be anything on it saying it is laser cut.

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I'm not really sure the exact process but laser cut wood usually has darkened almost black edges from where the laser cuts through the wood. The edges of these kits require almost no sanding at all and seem to be more exact so kits go together so much easier and the wood is almost silky. The die cut houses are known to have lots of splinters, and require lots and LOTs of sanding and wood filler becomes a best friend. They both can result in beautiful dollhouses but the laser cut seems to take less work to get there. Hope that helps some.

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Die cutting is basically like punching the pieces out of the plywood with a kit shaped cookie cutter (very crude description!) The cutter cuts nearly all the way through, but not all the way usually, and the pieces are kept in place with the remaining bit that hasn't been cut through. Because of this, when you punch the pieces out, the layer that hasn't been punched through is more broken than cut and therefore needs sanding. Sometimes the die cut is shallower and then pieces are more difficult to push out - that is why we often score the cut with a sharp knife to cut through the final layer(s) and reduce splintering.

With the laser cut, the laser cuts all the way through the wood by burning it, hence the black edges, and because it is cut all the way through, there isn't a layer that needs broken when pushing the pieces out. Laser can be programmed to be very very precise, and the cut is also generally much thinner than the die cut.

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Ahhhh, thanks for that info everyone.

Then my Buttercup is, unfortunately, die-cut. It actually looks more like "crunch-punched" to me! Some of the narrower sections actually got a bit crushed. There was also absolutely no way that the pieces could be pushed or punched out. The cut lines were so shallow that I just considered them to be guidelines for manual cutting and I went around every single one of the pieces with a sharp craft knife. Some of the pieces required several deep passes with the knife before they could safely be pushed out.

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My first bash of a Buttercup involved a kit that the plywood sheet had been miscut, so that the round window on the bay wall was a skewed ovel and the bay was 3/8" higher on one side than the other. It became a fireplace.

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