Patience, patience, patience!

[MQYJ]

A heads up to all you guys getting your new systems going. Take it slow, be patient, and let yourself learn it before getting too frustrated. I know from first hand experience that if you try to rush through things you will miss steps and something will go wrong causing burned up tips, wasted material or worse yet, potential damage to the machine. I was trying to rush last night and it basically went like hell, tonight, I took my time and everything went perfect.

Not a bad idea to keep a hard copy of the instructions handy and be sure to keep a log of the results and settings for each and every set up.

[Tuffjarhed]

I whole heartedly agree. I bet I'm on some sort of a P.I.T.A. list with the tech guys

[bigS-dime]

Originally Posted by Tuffjarhed

I whole heartedly agree. I bet I'm on some sort of a P.I.T.A. list with the tech guys

X2 fo sho

[Torchmate]

This is what I wanted most for this group. It can feel pretty lonely when you are sitting in front of a machine and just can't get it to do what you want. Especially when you spent a bunch of money on it. Don't think that it is any more lonely because you bought a $5k-$10k machine instead of a $150k machine or vice versa. I know people that have $150k machines from our competitors sitting in the corner gathering dust because they don't know how to run them and can't get any help. There is nothing I can really do for our competitors customers except tell them to sell the thing. But I can make sure that the only reason a Torchmate machine sits in the corner idle is because the customer did not feel like calling us and figuring it out.

I don't want anyone to feel like they are a PITA. For most of you, you are embarking on a totally new way to make parts. There is a learning curve. For those of you that have run CNC machines before and think you should be in full production as soon as the machine hits the floor, they all run differently. There is still a learning curve. Allow yourselves a little slack. There are literally hundreds of different settings for our machines. The plasma cutter has a whole learning curve in itself.

There are guys like Dallas (aka - stinkbug) that get their machine, put it together, fire it up and immediately look like they have been running the thing their whole lives. There are other guys like the one that flew into Reno last week to spend a couple days getting trained by my tech department because he has had the machine for 8 months and while his son can run it, he has no idea because he has never used a computer. There are still more guys that buy a Torchmate machine for their shop, never learn it for themselves because they "have other people to do that", then demand we fly in and teach them over and over because either their guys don't get it or they fired them and now have a new guy. (No one take that last one personal because there is more than one of you on this board )

The point is that you have to have patience and you have to give yourself time to learn. Learn how it works, how it goes together, how it comes apart. I wish that I could tell you that just by calling in you can avoid actually practicing, but it just doesn't work that way. Running any machine well is a skill that you must develop. We will always be here to help (at least as long as I am still in charge) and as long as you treat us with respect, we will do the same. No one is a PITA. Without your phone calls my tech guys wouldn't have jobs. 99.9% of the time we get phone calls and it is about teaching, not an actual machine defect. Trust me, 15 years when we opened our phone lines to tech support calls this wasn't the case. Maybe we should find another name for it now other than tech support. These guys are more like coaches and psychologists at this point. "Come on buddy, get down off the ledge. It's going to be OK. I will help you."

[MQYJ]

Originally Posted by Torchmate

"Come on buddy, get down off the ledge. It's going to be OK. I will help you."

This has been me a few times at around 1 or 2 in the am with parts needing to be at the powder coater before 8am. Nevermind the actual problem, I just needed a shoulder to cry on. lmao

[bigS-dime]

Originally Posted by Torchmate

This is what I wanted most for this group. It can feel pretty lonely when you are sitting in front of a machine and just can't get it to do what you want. Especially when you spent a bunch of money on it. Don't think that it is any more lonely because you bought a $5k-$10k machine instead of a $150k machine or vice versa. I know people that have $150k machines from our competitors sitting in the corner gathering dust because they don't know how to run them and can't get any help. There is nothing I can really do for our competitors customers except tell them to sell the thing. But I can make sure that the only reason a Torchmate machine sits in the corner idle is because the customer did not feel like calling us and figuring it out.

I don't want anyone to feel like they are a PITA. For most of you, you are embarking on a totally new way to make parts. There is a learning curve. For those of you that have run CNC machines before and think you should be in full production as soon as the machine hits the floor, they all run differently. There is still a learning curve. Allow yourselves a little slack. There are literally hundreds of different settings for our machines. The plasma cutter has a whole learning curve in itself.

There are guys like Dallas (aka - stinkbug) that get their machine, put it together, fire it up and immediately look like they have been running the thing their whole lives. There are other guys like the one that flew into Reno last week to spend a couple days getting trained by my tech department because he has had the machine for 8 months and while his son can run it, he has no idea because he has never used a computer. There are still more guys that buy a Torchmate machine for their shop, never learn it for themselves because they "have other people to do that", then demand we fly in and teach them over and over because either their guys don't get it or they fired them and now have a new guy. (No one take that last one personal because there is more than one of you on this board )

The point is that you have to have patience and you have to give yourself time to learn. Learn how it works, how it goes together, how it comes apart. I wish that I could tell you that just by calling in you can avoid actually practicing, but it just doesn't work that way. Running any machine well is a skill that you must develop. We will always be here to help (at least as long as I am still in charge) and as long as you treat us with respect, we will do the same. No one is a PITA. Without your phone calls my tech guys wouldn't have jobs. 99.9% of the time we get phone calls and it is about teaching, not an actual machine defect. Trust me, 15 years when we opened our phone lines to tech support calls this wasn't the case. Maybe we should find another name for it now other than tech support. These guys are more like coaches and psychologists at this point. "Come on buddy, get down off the ledge. It's going to be OK. I will help you."

I have been in the fabrication business for a while now and bought many machines and programs, etc... I absolutly have to give credit where credit is due the TORCHMATE tech dept. is the best I have ever had the pleasure of using. I have asked many questions, some good and some not so good, and always get immediate helpful solutions to my problem at hand. Plus getting this forum to communicate with others who have the same equipment is just gravy........