New school cutter. Any help appreciated

[dustywill]

hi I am Byron Williams and Teach industrial systems and Maintenance in Auburn Alabama at Auburn High School. We do a lot of fab work and bought a 4x4 EZ Router CNC plasma machine. It should be delivered next week. I am looking for any help getting this thing up and running. I also teach Machining and have a Vertical Machining Center, so I'm familiar with CNC, but plasma is all new to me. I am hoping to use it for mounting tabs and other fab type work, but I'd like to play with the art side of the machine. There are many possiblities for my students to earn our program some money coming into Christmas with the monogram signs that have gotten huge here. As gifts I think they'd sell well. I am trying to see what Font you guys use for this sort of detail and what gauge metal is usually used.

Thanks for any help you can offer. I have the site wired and have air to it already. Just waiting on the machine now.

Thanks,
Byron Williams
www.auburnschools.org/ahs/jbwilliams

[agri04]

I am assuming that you bought the green machine. If so in my opinion you bought a solid machine. I bought the 4x8 APC and overall it is a good machine. It uses belts and I don't think it is as accurate as gear track systems. It took me a few weeks to get the programs worked out. If you bought VCarve, it will make drawing alot easier. Mine came with cut2D it does not have many tools for drawing or editing. If you have any questions about running the programs I should be able to help you out.

[dustywill]

We bought the 4x4 apc. I had no idea how useful or addictive this thing would be. It uses a rack and pinion they have abandoned the belts and improved the machine some. I am overall happy with the machine I had trouble early on with delivery, but they made it right and provided 2 days of on-site training free of charge. It took a while to get he work flow down, but after about a month of pretty good use I am figuring it out. Still working on the finishing techniques though.