For most tabs I use a chisel. But I use V-Carve which does 3D pyramid type tabs.
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How much is the V carve you use? is that like subscription based or you pay a one off fee?
If you want subscription based then look at Carveco Maker Plus its equivalent to Vectric V-carve in features but a whole lot cheaper. I use it and prefer it over V-Carve. Here’s a link;
You may find that the smaller offering Carveco Maker is all you need at cheaper still
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Thanks, I appreciate that, but honestly, I’d prefer paying for it once opposed to subbing to it. Again though, I appreciate it, but if there’s something out there I can afford to buy once, like Corel Draw over Adobe Photoshop/Illustrator, I most of the time go with the One Time fee and own it. That’s just “me”, not knocking what anyone else does what so ever.
you can do that too, and its still cheaper
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Can you send me a link to the buy it/own it section, last time i looked at that website, I was on a page that frightened me the price was so high 
Actually I just checked and only maker plus and up has a lifetime licence and its more expensive than V-Carve pro But I think you get a lot more for your money. They often have big sales where you can buy a lifetime licence. But seriously look at the subscription that way you always get the most up to date software. Maker is $15/ month and maker plus is $50/ month.
The links I sent take you there. Also you can cancel with just a months notice. They have a huge tutorial resource and also look up Roger Webb on Youtube he is all over Carveco.
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Fusion 360 is free but it has a steep initial learning curve (I gather)
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I use double sided scotch tape. It has a great hold and peels off easily. I’ve used it to carve 1/4" plywood with no problem
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I was just looking at a roll at lowes, but thought I’d come do some searching online in hopes of maybe finding a more bulk for my dollar order. The roll at lowes was like 33’ for 20 bucks, I was thinking, heck I may could find 100’ for 20 bucks if I look in the right place lol
I totally get that. You don’t want that stuff anyway. That’s gonna be the 30lb tape. It will definitely hold, but it is a real pain to get off. I have been using the 15lb stuff. It’s only $11 for 29’. I still have to actually pop the piece off the waste board when it’s done but the tape peels off the back fairy smoothly. With the 30lb stuff its like scraping off a putty and leaves a bit of residue. You can easily get better deals online. I had just grabbed a roll of each just to try them out.
I like tape for a few reasons.
First, its almost impossible to find a decent size sheet of 1/4" inch that is actually flat, so the tape allows me to hold down the bows much better than edge clamping.
Second, if I set the final pass a few thou deeper than the wood, it will score the tape and allow me to remove individual pieces without having to take the whole board up. This is great for inspecting/tweaking your design before making multiples.
Lastly, cost of time. Even retail at Lowes, it’s basically 4 cents an inch. If you have even just 2 tabs on a 6" piece, is the time it’s going to take you to cut off those two tabs and sand them down flush worth more than a quarter worth of tape?
I have also toyed with the idea of just upgrading to a vacuum bed.
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I like using a utility knife and then hitting them with sander
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Damn! Really great points. I’ll tell you guys one thing, I had the “bright” idea (totally being sarcastic here) of saying to hell with it, I’ll just shoot brads in the corners and I’ll be good. You get thousands for a few bucks, long as you keep your gun hooked up, it’s quick, Shooooot, where could I go wrong right? WRONG!!! Pain in the Butt to pry up each and everytime, then remove the nails if you wanted to keep the whole piece, I just gotta do “something” else regardless. I even looked into the plastic brads, but shoot man, I only looked cause I thought someone made them for “All” guns, NOPE, you gotta buy “their special gun” to shoot the plastic nails…Man, that was like an extra 2, 3 hundred bucks that I was not anticipating, so…been shooting my regular in brands since I go the machine 
Pray for me yall…Pray, lol
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I use 18ga and 21ga nails all the time with the superglue/tape method. Shoot nails in the corner and one or two pieces of tape/glue on the interior “keeper” parts. It’s no big deal to drive a 5-1 paint tool under the piece to pry it up. Take off the tape and throw the rest in the firewood bin.
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There is a company that makes a nail gun and plastic nails specifically for CNC use If you should cut into a nail it will not hurt your bit.
Here is just one of many sites that supply composite nails/staples.: https://raptornails.com/
I tried using steel nails but had problems extracting the nails from the spoil board sometimes. If the nail breaks off it is hard to nip the part left over and the only other way would to be to drill a circle around the nail to extract it (plug cutters).
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