Full success on my first ever CNC plasma cut! I’m beyond excited.

Full success on my first ever CNC plasma cut! I’m beyond excited. Video forthcoming! For now a couple pics. There was almost no slag on this cut. As per charts for cutting thin stuff, 30 PSI on air, 20 amps on the plasma machine. I have it setup for 240V, for full access to cutting thick, even though I don’t even own any thick sheets of steel yet. Huge thanks to all of you who helped me so much. THANK YOU! 

LowRider 3 CNC DIY Plasma Table PART 12 - SUCCESSFUL FIRST CUT! Beyond excited!

Nice work!

I am guessing that you were adjusting the height to get something "close" to make sparks    But otherwise, the Probe Test cycle can be used to dial in the probe height and account for the float switch hysteresis so that 1. you will have accurate cut heights and that allows you to 2. set the cut heights per the recommendations in each material.

linuxcnc.org/docs/devel/html/plasma/qtpl...tml#qt_initial-setup    (probe test is described in the second set of directions in this section)

Enjoy the table! 

Congrats on your first cut...
The Cut Height and Pierce Height need to be real values.
To adjust for the hysteresis of the float switch you need to change Float Travel so that when you do a Probe Test the torch should stop at Pierce Height above the material.
You could probably also adjust your switch to decrease the amount of travel that you have which will then decrease the amount of time spent probing.
linuxcnc.org/docs/devel/html/plasma/qtpl...tml#qt_initial-setup

Edit: It seems my timing was bad. 
 

phillc54 wrote:

Edit: It seems my timing was bad. 

Great minds think alike... (we'll forget the second half of this)

It is also worth noting that you should use a stiff piece of metal to set the heights as the manual describes.

@snowgoer540 and @phillc54:

Thank you both for the hugely helpful info. You can certainly tell that I'm new, and also giddy with excitement about having a first test cut that actually worked. This is such a cool hobby!

Now I need to get down to actually learning how to use LinuxCNC, actually doing real probe test, and properly setting floating Z travel, figuring out how to do material settings, with their own integrated changes to cut height and pierce height, etc, etc.

You are welcome.  I highly suggest reading the QtPlasmaC manual if you haven't done so already.  It's probably a boring read, but there are too many neat features to list otherwise.  

I had previously "read" the "5.6. Initial Setup" sections on Z height, but I was simply too new to understand what I was reading, and too excited (over trying to get a functioning system) to bother over not yet understanding. Now that I have reached a milestone of getting a functioning system, I can buckle down and actually understand what I am reading. I will do my best to read the QtPlasmaC manual as well.

No worries, it's a lot to take in. As you have more questions, we're here to help.