I was really excited to get my hands on Cricut’s newest accessory for the Cricut Maker: The Scoring Wheel.  These will be a game changer for anyone who does paper crafting or has been using the scoring stylus for their projects. They go on sale TODAY on HSN and will be coming to stores and Cricut.com shortly!

Cricut’s new scoring wheel is actually TWO tools in one.  A single wheel for effortless folds on thinner materials (such as thin papers or cardstocks) and a double wheel for thicker materials (like cardboard, heavily textured paper and chipboard).   These wheels can use 10 times as much pressure as the scoring stylus.  That means can score and accurately crease a lot more materials.

To demonstrate the versatility of these new wheels and to walk you through exactly how they work, I put together a simple project that uses both the single and double scoring wheel.

This chipboard box with a folded fan style bow made from an old map would be the perfect box for saving vacation momentos as a thank you gift box for a house sitter or as a going away gift box.  Adding a map that is meaningful in some way can really personalize it
If you would like to follow along with this tutorial, you can also get the file for this project on Cricut Design Space

How to use your Cricut Scoring Wheel:

The design space software walks you through exactly how to use your scoring wheels, which one to choose and and when to change them out for cutting blades, but there are some little tricks that will definitely make it easier.  This project walk through will show you all the ins and out of this new tool.

Step 1: Open or create your file in design space

Scoring lines in design space are indicated as thin dashed lines.  You can see them in the file for this project. The white object will cut out of chipboard (on the thick solid lines) while the green objects will be cut out of map paper. The scoring tool will score along the dashed lines.

Step 2: Group objects made from each material separately 

You want to make sure objects that are made out of different types of materials are grouped together and are separated from other grouped objects. You also need to attach them to the mat to keep the scoring lines aligned correctly.

Step 3: Send your project to the machine

The software will tell you exactly what the steps are to both cut and score the different materials and walks you through the process.  For this project I first scored then cut the chipboard.

I was working with Cricut heavy chipboard in brown.  For creasing projects you typically want to use the light grip mats to make it easier to remove the paper.

Step 4: Select and Install the Correct Scoring Wheel

The beautiful thing about Cricut’s newest tool is that it is actually “smart” when it comes to choosing which blade is right for which material.  It is also automatically calibrated to the correct pressure.  It seriously couldn’t be simpler.
You select the material (in this case I selected “chipboard) and the prompts will tell you which wheel (in this case the double scoring wheel) to use.  The double scoring wheel is a completely unique tool which makes two parallel scored lines in your material to make it possible to fold thicker material without cracking.

Step 5: Replace scoring wheel with cutting blade

After scoring you change out the tool and make the cuts.  Super easy! 

Step 6: Assemble your project

This is how the scored and cut chipboard box looked after I removed it from the mat: I used a hot glue gun to assemble it. Remember not to glue the top closed if you want to be able to open and close it. To keep the lid shut I used baker’s twine.
To make the map paper bow, I just repeated this process for the second group of objects. Cutting and scoring some old maps I tore out of an outdated atlas.
This thin map paper used the single scoring wheel and resulted in perfectly spaced symmetric and crisp fold lines on my paper fan.   A single scored line is all that is needed for thin materials like paper or cardstock.  You can easily swap the scoring wheel tips onto the QuickSwap drive housing. Just look for the tiny 01 or 02 on each one. After folding the entire rectangle accordion style, I glued it into the shape of bow.The smaller rectangle of paper was wrapped around the center of the bow and it was glued to the top of the box. ( I glued both tips of the fan down to keep them open.)And that was all there was to it!

I could untie the twine to open the box and tie it again to close it. 

So you can see just how flexible and versatile Cricut's new Scoring Wheel attachment is, and just how easy it is to use it.  If you don't have one yet,  they go on sale TODAY on HSN and will be coming to stores and Cricut.com shortly!

This is a sponsored conversation written by me on behalf of Cricut. The opinions and text are all mine.