What’s the best way to cut small “dots” from masking tape? I’m trying to cut (many) 1/8th-inch circular masks and REALLY REALLY not having a great deal of success cutting good ones using my #11 blade and a circle template. Never used and don’t have a punch and die set, and don’t know if it would work with masking tape anyway, even if I did have one. There’s probably a handy-dandy tip out there— probably something obvious I’m not thinking of— so if you have it, please enlighten me before I start freaking out and injure myself. Thanks,
I’ve got a cheap punch set (2 punches & 2 center punches) from a tool shop, buy a cheap cutting mat & stick the tape to that, so you may be able to find a punch in the size you want.
Or find a brass tube in the size you want cut a length & chamfer an edge on it.
Have you got a Stationery store nearby? I’ve seen multi-coloured stick-back dots on sheets, but you might have to hunt for the size you want
One of those cheap leather punches with different size punches on a wheel, not recommended, mine is so cheap it’s only good for making crude holes in leather.
I use a leather punch (see image below), the type with the wheel of different sized punches. Slice a roll of masking tape into sections. That is cut it into piece of pie as the roll lays on its side on the bench. You should have several “end wedges” once you have done this. Essential you now have short sections of precut tape. Peel off an 1/8 of an inch of tape from one of these. Select the appropriate sized punch and start punching the slab of tape. If necessary you can push the cored pieces out using a piece of heavy wire or rod to get them out of the punch.
Now you have a stack of masking discs, use your tweezers or #11 blade to separate them one at a time from the core stack to apply to your model.
Cutting them one at a time is futile. As you need to have a backing to peel them from. By using a “stack” of layers of masking tape you have self backing layers of masking.
Thanks for your suggestions, everyone. My solution turned out to be a variation on one of them. I tried using the rotary punch that Hawkeye recommended (since I already had one hidden away), but couldn’t get clean cuts when cutting through many layers of tape as you suggested for producing lots of “dots” at once. When I did get a clean cut, I found it very difficult to separate the layers without damaging the dots. Got me thinking, though. I ran across a 1/8" “hollow steel punch” that cuts circles in a variety of materials, and since I was cutting 1/8" circles, I put several inches (single layer) of Tamiya masking tape on my self-healing cutting pad and used the punch to quickly tap out a couple dozen dots. The dots did not stick to the punch when it was pulled away from the surface, but remained stuck to the mat. I then was able to peel off the dots with my #11 blade or needle-nose tweezers without much difficulty. When I found the need to cut a few dots that were a bit smaller or larger than 1/8", I simply selected the appropriate size punch on the rotary punch tool and used it as a “hammer” to tap out as many dots as I needed. In fact, I really didn’t need the separate hollow steel punch at all as long as I had the rotary punch. Good thing, too— the rotary punch has 6 different sized punches and cost around $12, while the individual hollow steel punches are more than $5 each. Thanks again,
