NEW MACHINE BUILD: 5 X 10 Plasma with CandCNC Electronics

[fabguy]

Hello and thanks for all the great info and ideas here in the Zone. I have read through a lot of build logs (past and present) that have given me a wealth of information, without them I wouldn't be building my first cnc plasma table.
The bottom frame is 4" beam and the tank is 1/8" sheet, I formed up 2 pieces for the tank. Very heavy, good thing I had some help from the guys at the shop! The legs are 6" channel iron with pads and I am using a 6x4 angle for the linear rails to sit on.

[fabguy]

Have a couple pics of cutting the slat holders. I'm using 1/4 x 2-1/2 flat bar and am cutting the slots in a cold saw. There is an adjustment bolt on the cold saw that allows me to set my depth, it made a quick easy job of cutting all the slots.

[fabguy]

I have the PlazPack 1A for the plasma table. I also just bought a refurbished Dell computer from CandCNC, the Mach and license was loaded for me also. I think the PC is an '04 and it is in great shape with a 17" monitor. Pretty good deal in my opinion, I saved money! Also have a pic of the linear rails I will use for the dual drive, it is definitly overkill on its size. The rails are about 2" wide x 1 1/2" tall and each truck weighs about 15 lbs.. I got them from a local guy in town that buys out electronics, robots, etc. from factories that close, he happened to have 3 of these (all 10' long) brand new and still in the crate. $700.00 worth of overkill was a pretty good deal. The guy sells on ebay (concepts industrial).

[fabguy]

Have some more pics of the plasma table. I have done a lot of work to it since my last post as you can tell, the only problem is I forgot to take more pics of my progress. I was in such a hurry to get as much done as possible that taking a few pics was the last thing on my mind.
I ordered a Thermal Dynamics Cutmaster A120 plasma system from Indiana Oxygen, I'm hoping it will be here in about a week. I'm in the process of figuring out how the CorelDrawX5, DXFTool, sheetcam and Mach3 all work, I have no experience with any of this so it could get a little crazy.

[WSS]

Your build looks awesome. Are the parts laying close to it what you plan on making with the table? The only change I would make is to change the A120 for a Hypertherm 85. The new plazpak you have is capable of running the Hyt-connect and is quite powerful and the 85 will save you any money you might have saved otherwise in consumables.

Keep the pics coming!

WSS

[fabguy]

There is a grapple and a log splitter next to the table, the grapple was bought and I built the splitter, they both attach to a skid steer. The splitter only gets used on the larger logs that my spiral splitter i made won't split.
As for the plasma unit, I ordered the A120 mainly because we have 102 where I work and we really like it. It makes it handy with the parts and consumables being the same and also the possibility of my table being moved to work once we add on more work space.

[fabguy]

Working on the switchoffset, I used the V button and entered "switchoffset" as the variable and then entered the value. Here is what I am having problems with: the steps to open the post with a text editor or whatever in order to find the: distance , refdistance , switchoffset etc in the post. I have no experience in sheetcam or mach3 but am learning.