What the hell do I need ?? (humourous replies expected :-) )

[Greeny]

Hi Greeny
I have seen the glass equipment and yes, it is major engineering, saw a fantastic machine that did brilliant cutting at a Glassex show, a huge beast and at a very reasonable price of 120,000 Euros lol.

Alan

Was it an Intermac? The company I work for has 2 Intermac master grooves (brilliant cutters), an Intermac master edge, and a bottero edge. I don't run them any more, (but can get involved if they break!) They are big beasts, 3000 x 1500, 8kw spindles,auto tool change, the whole enchillada!! Tempremental buggers though! Italian.
The Bottero is a great machine, but you pay for quality.

I know your looking for a smaller machine and I don't mean to be negative, but water cooling and very abrasive swarf/grit take a big toll on the machines, I imagine stone carving will be very similar. Even though granite and marble are slightly softer than glass, the grit gets everywhere and seems to wear everything prematurely. Be very careful any machine you look at will go the distance. If poss ask to visit someone who's had one for a while. Also ask about tooling costs. Diamond tooling is darn expensive.
On the plus side I imagine there's decent money in custom stone carving though

Good luck.