[pipsqueaker]

Thanks for the replies everybody! People have been saying that the laser cutter's out of budget so let's throw that away, i knew it was a luxury anyways.

On the other hand, I'm interested in why you guys recommend the lathe so strongly? My understanding of lathes is that they're good for making shafts and things, but why does that give more utility than a 3-axis mill? I might not have mentioned this but we want to manufacture custom parts with these new machines, and it seems like a 3 axis mill would be much more useful/versatile than a lathe, which seems sort of limited in what it can do