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Re: Waterjet/Laser cutters in-house?
From what I've seen and heard, waterjet and laser cutters are prohibitively expensive and a bit unnecessary for the vast, vast majority of FRC teams. CNC mills and routers seem to be much more accessible, and popular among higher-resource teams. I don't know enough about them to know what the the cost of running them is, but I assume they are cheaper than waterjet.
One thing I'll throw out there is that I've been working with a CNC Plasma Cutter lately, and I think they could be great for teams. They typically run from $5,000 to $20,000. Parts often require cleaning and some post-processing after they're done, and plasma cutting doesn't hold tolerances as tightly as waterjetting, but there are ways around that. I think a CNC Plasma cutter could be a powerful tool in the right team's hands.
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