On Mon, 30 Jan 2012 19:54:50 +0000, David Billington
wrote:

Steve B wrote:
"Karl Townsend" wrote in message
...

"Steve B" wrote in message
news
While recently in Mexico, there is a glut of metal sculpture, not a piece
of which I saw bought. Schools of fishes, large sailfish, small
sailfish, three dimensional trees all cut out of a flat piece of metal,
then pushed out to achieve depth. I can see the cuts, and they are
definitely either plasma or laser. Some of them are very thin. How is
it possible to differentiate between laser cut goods and plasma cut?
Just how thin can a plasma cut be?

Steve

www.heartsurgerysurvivalguide.com


I've seen the same stuff in south FL. It looks to be done with an
inexpensive CNC plasma.

There is a HUGE range in plasma cutter quality. Goes from looking like a
cheap Oxy torch all the way to almost laser with the fine cut consumable
oxygen units.

"The Kid's" full time job is lead man on a bank of laser cutting machines.
The new unit cost $300K ($600K with the accessories) and it cuts to 1 thou
tolerance with a mirror smooth edge. They put a lot of stuff on that laser
that used to be CNC milled.

Karl


A lot of the stuff I saw was hair line thickness, with very little kerf, and
very little start up residue. Apparently, either plasma CNC or laser has
made it to the tourista market, but I ain't paying $50 for one fish, nor
$100 for a small school of fishes, and in the days and days of shopping, I
didn't see anyone else ponying up the $$$.

Fine looking stuff. But at those prices, it was "WHOA!". I can see some
time there on either a plasma or laser cnc, and some airbrushing, but the
prices were way out of line. In San Jose Cabo, the prices were way out of
line on everything. It seems like these guys meet every Thursday and
discuss the price of the week.

Steve

www.heartsurgerysurvivalguide.com

Steve

www.heartsurgerysurvivalguide.com



This reminds me of a story an old boss of mine told me. His aunt and
uncle bought a seaside souvenir shop to run as a venture and when they
looked at the prices of the goods and what they cost they thought they
were way overpriced and so reduced the prices to a level they thought
good. Business wasn't great and then they ran into the previous owners
and said as much and then mentioned that they had reduced the prices as
they had thought the stuff was over-priced, the previous owners said
that was not a good move as although the stuff was cheap if you priced
it so then the buyers would think that but if more expensive they would
think they were getting something quality even if it wasn't. The aunt
and uncle put the prices back up and business improved.

This is a common phenomenon in retail. My dad was a store manager for
Sears. They had a line of Puch (Austrian) bicycles that weren't
selling. Austrian products were dirt-cheap then. So they raised the
price by some large amount and they started selling great.

My wife was a fashion buyer for Macy's. When they had a new sweater
line that wasn't selling, they'd first increase the price to see if
that worked. Quite often, it did.

Years after his Sears days, my dad and mother had a gift shop. They
sold a line of decorator candles that was, at the time, unheard of
(Colonial). The big seller and premium candle was Bluegate. So they
raised the prices of the Colonial candles *above* those of the
Bluegates, and soon they were our top sellers.

--
Ed Huntress