Cutting boxes on the CMC

[Gesso&Bole]

I'm wanting to experiment with making cardboard boxes for a range of small frames that I sell.

I have a Gunnar F1 Hybrid, and have worked out the templates, but not found a supply of board to cut.

So my questions are

1. Does anybody do this regularly?
2. What sort of board do you cut for boxes?
3. Where do you source the board?
4 Is it worth the hassle vs buying boxes cut to size online?

TIA

[Not your average framer]

Unfortunately most box making materials are not cheap, unless you can buy in crazy quantities. Have you checked out the prices of Simons BACK/01, I use it for making up all sorts of things. I dont have a CMC, but I still get by pretty well when I need to make boxes, but there are other ways of doing things when you need to make boxes, without the use of a CMC. The basic techniques and box design methods are a lot diferent, when not using a CMC. The prices for boxes of BACK/01 are pretty helpful. I already buy some pre-made boxes from my local packaging supplier and It is cheap for smaller boxes and saves me plenty of time as well.

[Steve N]

I used to make some boxes for our mounts and some small 6"x6" frames I used to sell on ebay and Amazon, used a board from Simons, can't remember the ref, but it was white one side, brown the other, it the same material as cardboard corners. I then used a brown backing board from Simons BACK/0001which was/is stronger, used to cut it on our Valiani, in the Box section, first you use a creasing wheel then change to the straight cutter, the design I used was one I designed in a software on the web, just downloaded it to Corel Draw for fine tuning, found out there was a lot of layers, so it kept creasing the same line about 10 times, but once I knew this I would edit it in Corel Draw, then import it into the Valiani. The finished product was good, but don't make them very often now
The red lines are the folds and the black the straight cuts
The original board from Simons, white/brown, I think they used to use it to make small boxes for their D-Ring etc fr them to send out

[Not your average framer]

It does need to be said that most pre-made boxes need some internal packaging for items that you wish to post. I have a small paper shreder and use it to shred much of my unwanted paper and I sometimes use this as loose fill packing materials. Screwed up newpaper, or stuff like that works as well. At present I am not very interested in selling by internet, or mail order as it involve quite a lot of hasstle, but the fact that I can supply boxes with some of my ready made frames to customer's who want the frames, for framing items to sell on ebay can encourage these customer to buy my frames sometimes, because I can supply the box as well.

[vintage frames]

I have to post/courier all the frames I make.
I use double wall corrugated board from Kite packaging. When cut and folded into shape the boxes are almost crate-like in strength.
If the frame is glazed then I use that blue film stuff from Toolstation to protect from breakages.
These are all larger bespoke sizes so you might try single wall board for small frames.

[Richard Photofusion]

Companies like Kite Packaging can supply you with double wall card for less than most of the framing boards https://www.kitepackaging.co.uk/scp/car ... rd-sheets/ . I see Dermot had written about Kite....

For further design inspiration https://www.zund.com/media/2041/downloa ... og.pdf?v=1

[Gesso&Bole]

Thanks guys, I will have a go with those options, and see how I get on