Hello there! I have a class that is using the glowforge with Adobe Illustrator where they are drawing simple squares. When they go to cut, the glowforge is cutting on either side of the stroke line, double the cut time and creating a bit of a fire hazard. When I look at the vector line in Adobe Illustrator, there only seems to be one. They are saving them as a pdf. Has anyone run into this issue?
Thanks in advance!
Yeah, that’s fairly common with new Illustrator users. Click on one of the squares and check to see if it has a Fill color showing, or a Stroke color.
If it shows a Fill color but no Stroke color, remove the fill color and set the Stroke color to black. Then switch to Outline mode, zoom way in, and you will be able to see how many Cut lines are actually there. Delete one of them and you should be good to go.
There’s a tutorial here that explains what is going on in slightly more technical detail:
Sometimes what looks like a single stroked line is actually a filled compound shape. You just need to release the compound path, get rid of all the fill and the interior shape, and assign a Stroke color to the remaining path.
Also, not sure if it’s addressed in the guidance that Jules linked to, make sure that the stroke is set to center. If it’s set to inside or outside, it will look fine in the native AI file, but the SVG or PDF file that’s created will have a non-center stroke converted to a compound shape.
Ahhhh I will check that…that is guide is great but I definitely only see one path. They are literally just drawing squares and removing the fill and cutting. I have a slightly older version of illustrator than they do and mine works fine. I wonder if there is some new default in the newer version of illustrator. I will check their files when I get back to school tomorrow. Thanks so much!
I’ll bet that’s what it is…the newer AI versions cause that and I always forget to mention it. 
Also, if you use the shape builder tool it is notorious for making copies and attacking them when you add or delete a bunch of objects. Release your compound path to check. You can always undo if needed.
I’m so sorry to hear that you’re hitting this snag.
@Jules mentioned, this may be related to the files you are uploading to print. Could you let us know how everything looks after reviewing the files?
If you would like to post them to the thread, that would be great. Let us know how it all goes!
It definitely helped - there was still one student that had the issue of it going over the vector line twice but I think they had inadvertently doubled up the vector lines. Thank you for the help!
I’m so glad to hear that worked for you. I am going to close this thread now. If you have any other issues please feel free to start a new thread or email us at support@glowforge.com