Quote Originally Posted by fvfdrums View Post
My thoughts are going towards a low level gantry eg minimum deflection in relation to the x axis with the adjustability of the bed. I have access to a fair bit of 100mmx100mm off cuts and was thinking of using this as the base for the machine. Would this be too extreme for the gantry?
Excellent. Nothing's too extreme. The worst that will happen is you might need bigger motors, or have to accept lower feedrates (which is irrelevant for aluminium cutting). Design the machine then select the electrics to suit. Don't start trying to make things lighter to optimise the feedrate since a rigid slower machine is much better than a fast weak one.