Troubles with stacked text

I did a successful stacked text sign a couple of months ago so I of course thought that I knew what I was doing but I have proven myself wrong. I am trying to stack a couple of "S"s and when I do the bottom S gets its top cut off and looks fatter.

I have the combo of them unioned and then the top S as a separate vector. The bottom is .2 deep and the top is .1. I tried playing around with the depths, the ordering of the paths, etc…

Where am I going wrong?

Stacked_S.c2d (252 KB)

You need to draw the geometry up in profile and offset and union based on that.

Not familiar w/ the tool you used — what angle is it?

It is a 60 degree Vee.

I looked back at my previous sign and compared a million times. I don’t think I did that offset union on that one, but maybe I just can’t tell at this point.

First, draw things up in profile:

Then measure to get how much things need to be offset:

Then set up the first layer cut:

Then offset the geometry for the first layer by the distance determined in the profile:

Union the interior portion of this with the lower letter:

Add the outer inset geometry to the selection:

Then assign an Advanced V carving toolpath which starts at the bottom of the toolpath:

Attached as a v7 file.

Stacked_S_v7.c2d (320 KB)

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Thanks will for the step by step. I really don’t remember doing it that way on my prior attempt but I can’t say for sure. I will go through this again following your steps to make sure I have the concepts down.

While you were busy creating this thorough tutorial I decided to try a different style. I was really hoping to get something done today so that I can take it to a horse show tomorrow. This is the logo for a local saddlery place that appears at all the shows and I am hoping to strike up a relationship with them to make some custom stuff.

So, instead of V Carves I did through pockets. It is a stirrup with their company initials in it.

I like the way it turned out but I didn’t approach it this way initially since their S’s don’t really touch the stirrup in the real logo. I had to enlarge them to provide structure for this method.

Anyway, thanks for the instructions I will delve into it over the weekend and make a bookmark.

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@WillAdams I followed your steps on the original file and was able to replicate the simulation view. I have not cut it that way yet.

I attached a trimmed down version of my first attempt at stacked text. In this one I did not use the offset method you described but things worked out. In fact, I cut the “lower” level first, and it still looked good. There was some air cutting when it got to that top layer but it was a small project and I didn’t care.

I looked more closely and understand now why this one “worked”. It was the blockier nature of the lower text that made it look like it worked. If I disable the upper path I can see in the simulation that the lower text is even with the top of the stock. When I enable the upper path it has reduced the height of the lower text by the depth of the upper pass but it just wasn’t apparent given the font.

I guess I accidentally discovered another method that will occasionally work. I will try to burn the method that always works into my brain. Thanks for the help.

Stacked_Text_Test.c2d (560 KB)

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