Hi Largo.
Love the work.
I was going to ask you how much you stuffed up when testing all the different parameters but you covered that so I won't. I nearly heated the house for the whole winter a few years ago when I was testing my wood router and the stuff ups went the way of the slow combustion heater. :-)
Experience is hard won sometimes.
Isn't it funny when you see a piece of CNC equipment now you think "Gee, I reckon I could make one of those". :-) some of my friends think I am a genius but I just tell them that they can do the same as me by spending about 3 years on the internet and wasting about $5000 buying stuff you think you need but don't plus I have never had any kids so I have a bit more money to play with. I make a lot of stuff ups because I am mildly dyslexic so it costs me a bit extra than some "normal" people for that privilege .
I looked into using the 80-20 aluminium sections but the expense couldn't be justified for the development of my first laser. I just didn't know if the thing would work and I got burned by one company (PK Unlimited, they burned me so I burn back) selling me a laser they stated would last 10,000 hours, and it sat on the shed wall for 8 months while I built the machine and collected parts for it from all over the world. When I finally got around to installing it it was putting out about 10 watts down from the 30 I bought. A good paper cutter though.
That's when I turned to the American RF lasers and won't go back now. I am saving up for a 80-100 watt one for the future. ($16,000).
Lamacron
Linkmotion has a version for Plasma, router and laser so all you have to do is tell them what type you want but I can't see that buying a $1300 program would be any better than Mach3. For the laser it is but I don't think the rest warrants the expense. IMHO.
Rich.
I am not completely useless.......I can always serve as a BAD example.