New concept for a Folding CNC Plasm Cutter. What do you think?

[sean.suckling]

Hi

Months ago i posted a questionnaire about a Student project i was starting about a Portable CNC Plasma cutter.

Hear is the result, you may need to suspend your disbelife some what but if you can belive my clames are right please tell me what you think. I'm most interested in if you think the idea is a good one, then if the solution would work for you? but if you want to say anything elase please do, even if its just you quite like/dislike the Drawings!

i hope the picture comes out ok it is scaled form an A0 sheat.

thanks a lot

sean.

[kevin swan]

Sean nice idea neat size. Have you built one yet?

[sean.suckling]

thanks,

not yet, i may never get around to it! i have made some test rigs to see if the hinging mechanise and folding bed work.

hear is a video i hope you can view it

[Dustin407]

Sean,

Sweet idea on the folding/retractable table. Well I see you wanted to have some feedback. I think the overall design is pretty well thought out ( I like the swinging x,y arm and telescoping legs/slates), in the stand point of a manufacturing engineer it would have minor changes. I think the biggest question is Why would someone want to buy a portable cnc plasma. Im sure you would have a small market of buyers. Most companies do in house fab. and pull the cut parts of the machine and go work that piece. The key advantage of your idea is not only portable but a space saver. Most workout equipment sells because it saves house space, you would be saving shop space ( very valuable). I had a similar idea on saving shop space, A plasma cnc that is built like a panel saw. So instead of the table being flat it is upward at a 75 deg. angle. Overall, idea great... Marketing aspect may fall short... I love the 3-d rendering of the unit.

Thanks for the post, Dustin I hope I helped a little.....

[sean.suckling]

Hi thanks a lot for the reply Dustin.

you make a very good point about the small size of the market, one i am all to aware of. This was a university project and as such is based more around the academic work rather than the business side. From an assessment point of view as long as you make the right design decisions based on the size of market you have then it is fine by them, things like, don't die cast things if you are only making 20 of them. In the end it's not a marketing course! Since is it an academic project you make some assumptions at the start and then go and do research and find out more, invariable this means what you are working on changes and the final out come is a compromised combination of what is best and what is achievable in the time, I am pretty happy with it and so were my tutors in the end which is good! For the final presentation i relay pushed the space saving and convinces aspects.

As for the angled table I thought it was a good idea too and have looked into it and spoke to a few people about it, form my research it seemed the cut quality was lower and fare amount of dross formed on the cut pices. That said i am by no means an experienced CNC user or have used a plasma cuter that much so there may be ways around it, it you try it i would be glad to know how you got on.

I'm glad you liked the rendering thanks a lot, i relay appreciate the feedback

Sean.

[shallis2]

I like it

Being someone who has a small workshop and not a huge need for a cnc plasma. i.e i wouldnt use it very often, it looks excellent.

good luck with the project.

[Whacko]

Ok for hobbyshop, not practical if it can't handle standard sheet sizes

[freak_brain]

Sean,

There are uses for that type of plasma cutter. My brother and make custom parts for race cars. Aluminum valve covers are one of our biggest products. I have often thought it would be nice to have a small machine to throw into the race car trailer to take with us to races and swap meets. This would make it to where we could make the "stuff" on site and not take order. I think we miss out on a lot of sales because people don't want to give us money for a promise of making and sending the product later. Just my two cents


Allen

[ViperTX]

Allen,

I must have missed something...aluminum valve covers are your biggest products and you would like to have a plasma cutter to make parts at races and swap meets.

So, what do these AL valve covers look like?

Thanks,
Paul

[sean.suckling]

Ok for hobbyshop, not practical if it can't handle standard sheet sizes

Well the idea was that it would mainly be small workshops and hobbyists that it was aimed at.

As for the sheet size... the machine was designed for dealing with stander European sheets witch comes in 2x1m, 1.25x2.5, and 1.5X3m. the most common and widely used is the 2x1m witch the machine can ether use by ripping it in halve and using it in to sections or by indexing one large sheet.

But the sheet size is a good point it is just a mater if trading off work area for portability.

S

[sean.suckling]

Sean,

There are uses for that type of plasma cutter. My brother and make custom parts for race cars. Aluminum valve covers are one of our biggest products. I have often thought it would be nice to have a small machine to throw into the race car trailer to take with us to races and swap meets. This would make it to where we could make the "stuff" on site and not take order. I think we miss out on a lot of sales because people don't want to give us money for a promise of making and sending the product later. Just my two cents


Allen

Yeah that is an interesting idea, I guess one problem might be powering the whole set up and providing an air supply, you would probable need an air compressor and generator depending on the thickness of aluminium and plasma generator you had, making the whole set more complex, but manageable.

I saw this plasma machine and thought of incorporating it in the design but it was getting a bit late in the project but it thought it was interesting using a fluid instead of air to contain the plasma stream, i dont know any more about them realy but this.

http://www.axson.se/pdf/fro_pre_transcut300_eng.pdf