I am not a production business. I have 6 or seven suppliers that i buy cut metal work from for my retail business. I am only doing choice peices or peices that cannot be accommodated affordably or timely . Also, just to prototype… so by no means am I trying to do production work on this table… I have run about 4 salable pieces greater than 12 x 12… and about 1 dozen pieces about 9x5 since i bought the table…( may) Nowhere near enough to pay for the table yet. I would say i have produced a total revenue on the table in the 500-600 range. Plus a bit of testing etc.
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That is what I think I want to do , Of course i am not in production mode or volume , But I do see enough market for what I do , that this is viable. And no I cannot afford a 15k or 20k set up at the moment - but I can afford a 3k deal, i would have done the pro - easily. and still might As I do like the THC. but I like teh smaller table… and indexing works for when I need. So for me I am good with the Pro on the standard table. I am thinking about buying the THC unit. and making some adaptations to stanchion plates and water table slats size etc… I have some ideas… I think I can get this thing to production quality and no where near a 15k price tag… and yes if you are in full production mode… 15k might be the way to go.
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Nice pieces, Dicky, didnt you have post about your THC setup? Can I ask what clear you are using on the La Forest piece? I have been using clear powder I like, But heating really messes with patina colors.
Not a bad thought at all… 
I have been reading about all the problems some folks are having with their Crossfires, and I have to tell you, I haven’t had one problem with the unit or the programming with Fusion. I’m just a regular guy not collage educated. Sure it takes time to get use to it however it is really a nice system. I use it for my project 1957 Ford Custom 300. Sure its not a high end piece of equipment but it serves my purpose.
Very pleased.
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I guess if you were cutting out a simple square with a single hole in it – you may not have the issues with fusion , I experience… but deleting a line takes minutes for me while the system hangs and waiting circle spins - get a not responding by windows… then eventually un hangs. and resumes… Its not one file - but all my files - they are not simple shapes but they are all 2 d… and considering fusion is designed for 3 d… complexity of a 2 d shape should not do this… by the way… looking at my computer , i am not even using a 1/3 memory or 10 percent processor… also, fusion is not application that resides on your computer really - its really software as a service… dependent upon interner connection… and works way to hard to get through your normal windows firewall. i have to turn off my connection to get it to open - this was not the case when i first installed. only after updates of both windows and fusion… good luck… My fusion worked fine when first installed - had some prpblems , thne 2nd update seemed to help -but 3ed smoked it… and been getting worse ever since. as for the table , i have never complained… even when i had no water table… this was a new occurrence with warped meal , its not really a cnc problem. as i see it or even cross fire or fusion issue… other than perhaps lack of thc… but i dont think most people are getign 1/2 inch warps in 20 inches… that is why iam here- i have cut multiple peices before with no such issue with and without water… but never in the cold… that is all. and this is metal from a lot i have been cutting without issues
I understand the issue with Fusion being a cloud based system. I’m fortunate to have a really fast connection with lots of bandwidth both up and download. I would guess there are programs out there that are not based the same way Fusion is, I would imagine they cost you though. It has not been trouble free for me, however it has been of my own making. It is true, all of my work is 2D, brackets, hole plugging, boxes and the like. The water table stopped nearly all the warping on the thinnest metal I use, which is 18 gauge. I’ve cut strips as long as the table will allow a 1/2 in wide using 18 gauge cold roll with very little warpage. I will be soon looking for programming that is compatible with the crossfire system that is more user friendly. I don’t need all that Fusion can do. Please don’t misunderstand me, I’m not calling anybody a cry baby. I can understand your frustration. Some don’t have the time to sit for hours trying to get something ready to cut as I do. I still have much to learn and continue to do so.
Good luck, my hopes are that all will work out for you. Happy New Year.
Fusion is actually a hybrid application. You can run it offline (although you will still need to connect to the mothership once a month) iron the web as a SaaS application.
The local component of Fusion is very dependent on the quality & type of your graphics card. 3D rendering us a very graphics intensive process for computers. If your graphics card is not designed for that type of work, the processing gets offloaded to your CPU or even the cloud computers. That really bogs things down because if the volume of calculations needed even to do something as simple seeming as dragging an object across the screen. Most laptops have general purpose graphics adapters and no real way to upgrade them. Desktop units and gaming laptops are better suited.
If all you are doing is 2D (flat) part design then I recommend using Inkscape (free) for the design process and Sheetcam ($150) for the toolpaths & GCode generation. Those will both run well on general purpose PCs. You also won’t need to worry about planes and extrusions and constraints and other 3D modeling concepts that aren’t necessary for almost everything I’ve seen on the forum.
If you’re doing a lot of sheet metal folding, Fusion has some great features to make the design & cutting really much more precise (like automatically calculating and including bend radius and flattening 3D designs to cut).
I was having the same issues, chasing my tail trying to figure out why the steel was all of a sudden getting hotter than normal and warping causing the crashes and ultimately blowing out tips, etc. I found I had put my swirl ring in upside down in my torch. I flipped it over, changed my consumables to a fresh set and haven’t had an issue with warping since. Might give that a try and see if it helps?
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Most graphics card are capable of 3d rendering and should have sufficient power for light duty… again , i am not doing this all day… and dont expect it to fly… but i dont expect to hang again it worked before some updates… so its obvious its not computer … and if their coding is buggy… its more likley you will need more horse power to process it… bottom line - it should run a modern non budget laptop. and though you almost never find dedicated graphics in laptops… which i know a lot or most people are using for this work. it should be no problem. i even have dedicated memory on my graphics card… its not all shared. windows 10 is a bad child too - last update smoked my fingerprint reader that worked perfect since day one… - doesnt work at all now… not at all.
Sure. But there’s “can support” and “provides a good user experience”. Just like Windows can run on a 1GB 1GHz PC. Everyone by now knows minimums do not meet user’s acceptable performance.
Unless the update puts more demand on computer resources. But if it makes you feel better, blame the software - won’t change things.
Why? Because you expect it to? Sorry, but software is designed for a target user base and the resources they can reasonably be expected to have. Autodesk applications including Fusion are targeted to a professional user who can afford appropriate resources to run it. There are people who might expect it should work on Chromebooks but it won’t. Or their iPad but it won’t. The typical Crossfire owner is not the target user Autodesk designs their software for.
Probably one of the worst things they did was offer a hobby license. Students and startups will grow into
professional users. Hobbyists usually won’t.
Yeah. The Nov Windows update toasted my Surface - a machine made by Microsoft. Had to buy a new laptop while on a business trip. Regardless are you posting on Microsoft forums about how their software should work on a budget device? Are you telling them how you expect it to work and how they’re failing because they’re not meeting your expectations? Are they listening to you?
Fusion 360 is not an appropriate application for the Crossfire user demographic. Inkscape is fine for 99% of what people are posting here. The problem is there’s no other free GCode generator that Langmuir could send people to. So instead they recommend Fusion because it is free. Inkscape & Sheetcam is a better solution but then the package price of the Crossfire goes up $150. I expect that’s part of the reason for their new software for the Pro - to get out of the support difficulties & customer problems that Fusion has created for them.
You know , fusion ran pretty good when i first installed it and even better after the second update it did… Then it all went to hell when they started that new licensing stuff… I mean really bad… like a corrupt file or somethign wouldnt even open - i have to disconnect from internet to get it to open. I have read others having issues So. I guess i mislead you into thinking there is some inherent problem on my end. I should have made it clear… that i have it run pretty clean but after several updates its unusable… SO how is that my hardware when I first installed it then things got goofy after first update - and then second update seems to fix it… and then third got much worse causing it to take for ever to load - 4th update will not open at all uinless i disconnect from net… then opens fairly quickly… i see nothing in windows firewall blocking it - i see lots of messages about problems with their server… etc… and then after that update with license stuff… its unsable…
James, just so you know, my computer is not even hot or slow - its just program not responding stuff - that is not processor that is too slow - or not enough memory or even a GPU… my computer is not even running 25% of memory with fusion nor is using more than 10% of cpu when i am having these issues.
Its just a bad program like Windows 10… i will never work with windows again, next unit mac only… and I am tech computer IT guy… 33 years experience. I know as much about hardware and software as anyone… and what is a program issue and what is hardware issue. I will stake my reputations and life on it.
Also, for thought , i just opened it now and its choking not responding… I dont even have a file open - and you talk about being able to support it - it was never like this and you suggest update are using more resources-- its like you are defending the maker of crap software for some reason… and if it were great software there would be no reason to update 2 times a month.
I am still waiting for fusion looks like it wont load anymore - it was loading and choking before now its not loadable what happned- oh yeah windows updated this was the first time i opened since windows updated… so they do not play with each other - we dont have a single simple file open - i cant open the program anymore - disconnected or connected to the internet…
its toast.
still not responding… looking at task manager - memory usage less than 1/2 gb… of 16 gb … cpu usage 0 GPU usage 0 - power usage very low…, So, are you sure this is hardware problem - that i dont have enough resources?
just opened the log files - everything pertaining to connection issues with the server and other things that look similar. while i was doing that my fan kicked in high checked task manager and fusion is using a good percent of cpu about 26 percent - high power usage… And network High usage… So , there you see… program as service… its trying way too hard to access stuff over the net and its just causing all sorts of problems.
Windows 10 sucks, It doesn’t play well with others. Every time it updates I lose files and have to reboot AOL. I have even lost some ebay sales items after a windows update.
yeah my computer i used metered connection because it keeps updates at bay. but it eventually finds it way through… I run a retail store online and yes we sell a lot for christmas, I wake up last week to ship stuff and on my screen windows needs to update… you must restart… no way to delay… I am in christmas high season, orders galore shipping issues with vendors etc. and ihave no computer on the 17th,., i just sit back and hope for the best. luckily i put in an ssd a few months back . it took about 4 hours to update and all came back up minus my fingerprint reader… at least as i know now… if no ssd id have been without a computer all day… TY MS…
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I traded my 2" slats for 1-1/2" slats. Its only drawback is that it limits the size of the piece you can use. This allows the metal to be in closer contact with the water. I’ve been doing this for about a year using 14 - 18 ga steel.
In terms of weight? or because the slats are below the edge of the water table? I 'll give 1 3/4 a try , i think. I hear some guys spray things down while cutting - i can’t imagine that being really effective.
I am pretty sure , I will end up with sheet cam at the end of the day, AND a THC added., question is to use lanmuirs kit or DIY…
The 1-1/2" slats are right at the water line. Because the water line is below the edge of the aluminum water table, my stock must be no larger than 24x24.