Ed Huntress fired this volley in
:

Other than that, where are they using them for commercial machining?
They're great hobby machines for the reasons you describe. But that
doesn't translate to commercial viability.


They don't make much sense in a 'general machine shop' unless the shop
has high production on a few parts. They're still used effectively in
medium-run production shops. One of their nice features is that they're
"set and forget" devices. Sort of like a programmable surface grinder,
they just go 'til they're done, then stop.

They don't fill the niche they used to, because of the advent of so many
CNC-controlled cutting methods available now, but they still have a place
in factories.

I disagree with the (next) poster as to their usefulness for the hobby
shop. It's a few square feet and several hundreds of pounds of wasted
weight and floor space for a hobby shop. 3D CAD/CAM takes over for one-
offs.

Lloyd