Anything Manufacturing - Small to Medium Scale Metal Work (CAD/CAM included!)

Table listed for sale

 

Also, knocked this out real quick.





Damn near perfect. I opted to drill the holes rather than cutting them on plasma seeing as how they were really small.

I slept on this one, my fault for not checking my mailbox for so long

 

getting the STV?

 

Yeah.

Initiated a withdrawal on an index fund and figured fuck it, let's upgrade now versus later with tariffs hitting and all.

Even though STV is all made in-house in the US, there's still the sourcing of raw material which could affect pricing even for them.

I was really wanting a Pro since it both uses a welded frame and has the awesome gear reduction system. It also has the homing feature built-in along with the leveling feet.

However, the Pro only gets delivered via a car trailer and/or flatbed truck. So it'd be up to the buyer to unload it and place it where needed.

I'm not going to buy a forklift for a one-time use that's for sure.

So I'll be buying the modular setup, adding the leveling feet, homing kit, and optimum software. Brings it up to $6,500 (before shipping) adding a 5 gallon bucket of fluid additive.

The Pro would be $8,148 (before shipping) so I could still add the $900 gear reduction system to the modular and be below the Pro price.

 

Don't have the patience, know-how, or downtime availability to build my own table.

 

@se7enine
@Wulf

Read up, that's why I made the forklift comment

 

I think it was a smart move buying now... prices will only go up. the tariffs are one reason I just spend a bunch of money of getting the new centroid acorn plasma control board and THC. along with the parts to build a new 100ah solar battery setup for camping an other uses that future may soon bring to bear. along with getting the parts to finish a couple of AR-15 builds I been sitting on for a few years.

I barely have the patience, an only had a little past a basic understanding of the know how, and most assuredly do not have the time. I been working on it for what 4 years now LOL yea it can cut parts, but I am still not happy with the overall function / reliability. lately life has thrown a curve ball on several levels some of it good some of it not so good.

The STV pro price would have been a bargain for what I have into my table right now, you build a table because you want to build it, not because its faster or cheaper to do so. the only advantage has been spreading the cost out over time.

 

I really enjoyed building my table. It was a cock sucker at times figuring shit out. I'm glad I did it. I understand the ins and outs of the controller and steppers. It makes it easy to trouble shoot, as well.

 

That was me. But I couldn't tell you which process they use.

 

Just sucks that I was sort of forced into it (kind of).

I always intended to move up to an STV table, and stop at the 4' x 4'. The size is big enough to do a lot of decent work (especially when it's a round item), but I also have no plans to load up steel that'd be painful to manhandle. I just thought I'd stick with the Langmuir for a bit longer at least until the end of this year.

Don't want to pay more in the future for something I could get at this pricing now.

Anyway I just had someone leave (wanting to place a deposit) but my table is pretty much sold. Posted it for $2,500 which is the average going rate for a Pro with THC equipped. Just not getting picked up today cause I'll be leaving town for about a week.

 

I totally agree with this being one of the points for building your own.

Me, having gone through so many issues between both tables (both troubleshooting and fixing) not to mention helping others with their own tables, I would want that same level of understanding that most won't ever have.

 

Was watching a few videos regarding Optimum's software for STV tables.

I won't go into what it all offers and how it compares to Firecontrol - I can it's just that I'd rather perform such an assessment at a later date with more hands on experience.

Anyway I asked STV this on their Youtube video and hopes to get an answer.

"One thing I do not understand - why is there an adjustment for kerf allowed in the CAM process if Optimum is stated as already having a built-in tool library for Hypertherm machines? This implies that the tool library does not contain kerf data, is this true? Or is the adjustment just a means of overriding the value in the built-in library?"

I'll provide their answer here once I get one.

 

Did you pull the trigger?

 

The invoice is created.

Just waiting for funds, as a withdrawal takes a few days.

We're heading out of town tomorrow for Legoland this week anyway so there won't be much of anything going on until I get back.

 

Just curious if you looked hard at arc light too. My commercial metal worker friend swears by his and it has a lot of cut time on it.

 

Oh for sure, they're the bees knees when it comes to CNC plasma but there are a ton of reasons why going that route wouldn't make sense for someone like me.

1. I'm just a hobbyist really. I do make parts for many, whether it's one off or small production but I keep it low volume enough to not make it feel like a job. I love what I do.

2. The level of accuracy required has been achieved and repeated over and over with a hobby-grade table. I've showcased this many times and have even compared my cuts to that of higher end machines.

It's like a rifle. Many rifles are far more accurate than the nut behind the trigger. I say this as a competitive ELR shooter that only deals with custom made rifles

People will overlook an old Winchester 64 or Remington 700 rifle cause it's in an old man's stock. Not realizing that something as simple as the proper weight projectile and a disciplined shooter will outshoot the next guy with his custom CF wrapped barrel, tactical chassis rifle.

3. Budget being a big factor here. I wanted to stick to under $10-12k. Going this route along with selling my own table leaves cushion for material (for test cutting), consumables, more tooling (whether it's a tube bender or brake) or maybe even upgrading my plasma cutter.

Gotta remember, being retired I'm also on a fixed income

 

@Zebinator

You just ordered a Crossfire Pro right?

What made you go that route vs STV, Spark Robotics, Arc Light Dynamics, ShopSabre, etc?

Just a question out of curiosity of course! I ask because you're a machinist (or have machinist experience) so guys like you are all about accuracy with the tightest tolerances.

 

I thought Arclight made some tables in about the same price range so that’s why I was curious - I’m still just trying to get a lay of the land! I got the Langmuir to keep my investment low until I can figure out how useful this will be to me. And you convinced me (simply by doing awesome stuff) that it’s possible to get awesome results with their tables. Tho I do get what you mean by “you’ll be reminded of their quality every day” - it is a little janky and the amount of “quality of life” stuff I already want to do just to make it easy to use is a little daunting. Stoked to see what you do with the new table!!!

my manual mill and lathe are maybe the Toyota Corolla machine tool equivalents from the 70’s but if you work at it they can produce good results. Definitely not a Hardinge or a Bridgeport! So I get it!

 

One thing I realized very quickly is a skilled machinist can do quite a bit to make a high quality piece with a janky and sloppy manual machine. However, in my experience I don’t understand enough yet of what RIGHT looks like to know better. I upgraded my lathe to something contemporary for me to learn. It is amazing how much faster and more precise the new machine is and user friendly. If I had all the muscle memory from working them for years then it would be transparent.

 

case in point... it all started from him making his own scratch-built v10 engine, and then wanted to make the v10 do something in a vehicle instead of just take up shelf space...
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tO-sm2j31us