How to remove overlapping paths for laser cutting

[Suzanne23]

Hi there.

Thanks to the forum I have been able to do the design to the left, where each stripe of the balloon shape is it's own shape.  They can be cut on a laser cutter then put together again like a puzzle.   Now I am creating a laser cut design with overlapped shapes, and I need to remove the paths in the overlapping parts so that the final cuts would look like the picture on the right, where I simply used fills to hide the overlaps.  I have tried all of the path tools, plus shape builders and I can't seem to cut out those stripes from the lower balloon in the overlap.  I managed to do it once, but I worked on it for hours and it was a fluke I can't repeat;) 

I need all of these separate shapes (including the truncated stripes) so I can enlarge each piece to account for kerf on the cutter.

Any help would be greatly appreciated!

Thanks

Sue

[lambiloon · Accepted solution]

Hi its really very easy using shape builder tool in Adobe Illustartor all will be good then....Thanks.

[Nick Gioia]

In the Pathfinder use trim. Once you do that double click inside and you should have pieces.

[Suzanne23]

My goodness....I completely forgot about the dragging of the shape builder as opposed to the clicking....I won't explain but I have had to do that all week for something completely different.  Thanks again everyone!

[KeysOpenDoors]

Hello!  I'm also attempting to prep complex artwork for a laser cutter.  One would think I could remove any lines underneath a closed shape?  But the results never end up looking all that good if I'm using the "shape builder" tool or "minus shape in front".  They end up affecting other parts of the artwork not near the intended area, as seen on the screen recording.

A clipping mask creates the PERFECT result but it's not distructive... so the cutter will still attempt to follow those lines.

[samishlamish]

Hi all !
Path finder tools can work, but can be also very tricky for laser applications, resulting in very long time consuming process, or errors in design.
The Illustrator action this guy has designed seems to work very good :

https://jackforge.com/delete-overlapping-lines/