Does anyone have any experience with the “PlasmaCam” CNC machine?
I am very interested in the ease of maintenance and the possibility of talking with someone who has one, and visiting someone who has one.
We quite literally just purchased one and got it installed in the last month. |
Impressions: Not so good.
The machine itself is just what you’d expect, a gantry on x/y axis with an attached plasma cam. It’s well built, but has some weird quirks.
The software, however, is complete garbage. having worked with plasma cams for the past 10 years, I can say this completely. Simple things like measuring your cut length are needlessly complicated.
TLDR: it’s a good machine, software makes it fail.
http://www.cncplasmacutterinc.com/
we have had 1 of these 4x4 water table 60A dedicated cutter, dedicated computer, and router attachment. We like it. feel free to ask specific questions.
11/193 owns one, and I was primary op for two years as a student.
Definitely took some trickery to get good feeds and cut power/height in aluminum worked out, as well as some really nasty work to get holes that were clean, but once it’s running, you can really fly through roughing cuts for parts.
Can confirm, software is not great, required quite some work to get running on modern machines.
Don’t know how much they still use it, but was a great intro to CNC and CAM tool, and was a key part of the 2013/2014 seasons.
We have a shopsabre plasma CNC. It did take some time working with cut speed and ideal voltage. We also do not have the proper routing software for the plasma so we have to change some thickness settings to match the plasma cut.
Once this was figured out we have cut all our plates on the machine. The kerf(aluminum slag) is minimal now and only requires quick processing with files. My two student welders also know that the plasma oxidizes the cuts so the aluminum needs to be polished down to get a clean weld.
Take a look at the attached pic. The machine has been great! It’s our first season with it and really makes the kids get CAD done so we can do this work.
We’ve been running our PlasmaCAM for about a year and a half now. You definitely want the auto height control. Overall, it has been a rather fantastic and trouble-free machine. It sees a TON of use here on 696, on almost a daily basis. It’s just so darn fast and easy to make something on it. It does what it’s supposed to do, and I’ve found the software to be very workable, once you understand its somewhat bizarre keyboard shortcuts. If you think you’re going to get super-precise fine-finished edges and perfect holes though, keep dreaming. We use it more for mockups, prototypes, and rough stock cutting. We’ve done a fair bit of 1/4" steel plate on it as well. On aluminum, 6061-T6 will warp badly, but 5052 cuts quite nicely on it.
Make sure you have a well ventilated space, like, practically outdoors. The smoke and dust is unbelievable. You’ll listen to everybody tell you how bad it is, but you won’t believe it until you buy one. Ask me how I know… It will cover your entire shop with a nasty metallic grit. Not something you want to breathe either.