Been studying up and getting ready to start cutting. This is my first run at plasma cutting, have a lot of experience with CNC Wood milling and design.
Plasma Cuuting is similar but different in considerations you must consider befor cutting.
In particular with precision. In wood milling the software compensates for the endmill size in its toolpath creation so you can get precision material removal to within a few thousandths of an inch. But with even the basic kerf setting of .055” say using a .8 nozzle standard that comes with say the Razorcut 45. How can you ever get fine detail with a .055” kerf width.
Only other nozzle I’ve seen available will go down to a .6 nozzle
Plasma CNC is more like laser cutting than CNC wood/metal milling. The latter use tools with specific diameters so you can calculate kerf automatically.
Plasma & laser kerf depends on tip, material, power and speed. The .055" kerf width that Langmuir used in their tutorial videos for setting up a torch in Fusion is just one of many kerf values. What you want to do is do a line (& circle/square) cut test for each material and the appropriate tip/speed/power that yields the best cut. Then define different torches for those different materials and use the torch in your Fusion library that matches what you’re cutting. Fusion’s toolpathing will adjust for the appropriate kerf just as your laser or even the CNC router will - it might not be quite as exact because of the variable nature of an energy beam vs an end-mill but it’ll be pretty darn close.
I think most people made the default torch in their Fusion library and haven’t made multiple ones customized for different materials but that’s the best way to get the software to make the appropriate allowances for your torch.
Gotcha, thank you for very useful information!!
All my experience up till now is CNC wood milling using Vetric Software
All of my plasma cutting has been by hand mostly on exhaust systems and chassis as I was a professional Auto Technician for 20 years.
Nice to be challenged again learning something new a having you guys on the forum for guidance!! Nothing like this was available back on those days only the guys in the shop that had been there longer than you at that time and we’re doing it longer then you at the time.
But I create all the designs in CorelDraw and then bring them into Vectric for toolpathing. What’s really cool is I can take the same file and bring it into Fusion for the Crossfire or into the laser for cutting/engraving.
Once you get the mechanics of the toolpathing down, the design is where you’re going to spend most of your time
