Well Ive taken the plunge. The Slow Boat from China is delivering me a Steeltailor Machine (We needed a Portable machine) and Ive just spent the rest of the Kids Collage fund on a Hypertherm 1250 G3

This Question is about Software?

Now Ive been using Solidworks cad software for a little while. The Machine Comes with FastCam (Basic addition) but I see many other options available

So in your experiance what is best to use, What software would you recommend to give me the most complete package.

I look forward to tapping into your knowledge:)

It is going to depend on what applications you are going to be putting on the machine. What kinds of parts, basic profiles that require minimal nesting or multiple parts that would require advanced nesting like jitter and shake. How much material do you allow for scrap/skeleton, things like that.

Thanks for the reply

Im in the Stainless Exhaust business. So off the mark I will be doing light production of Exhaust Flanges. From one off's to small production runs.

I need a package that will allow one off prototyping to small production runs. And I want to start with whats best as an overall package and will cope best with the different directions the business could take, inc expansion to larger table cutters

As Im going to be using a lot of stainless so Nesting is important to me.

We will also be offering a design and production service for a number of automotive clients that we currently deal with.

Long term I hope the machine is given a hard life :-) and make me a few $$$ back

ProfileLab from Cadlink works for us and is the default package that we supply with the machines we build. It has autonesting and is very affordable.

Whacko
http://www.cadlink.com/products/profileLab/