Are Plasma Cutters "Finicky"?

[grsthegreat]

i have a hypertherm 1000 ..have used it for about 4 years. love it. i have a refrigerated air dryer to get the water out, and have a mechanical and hand torch heads. the consumables are a bit pricy....about $9.00 per set of tips and internal electrode. the amount of time they last is baffling. sometimes they last for months..other times only a few weeks. ive never been able to figure that out. I cheat cause i have a plasma cnc cutting table, but i just love the results i can cut. very little dross and minor cleanup required to prep for welding. sometimes my 3/8" steel cuts are cleaner than the 16 gauge cuts, but with the fine cut tips i can get nice 16g cuts also. the biggest problem with the smaller hand held / portable kits is the built in air compressor that they have. ive used a few of them in the past, and they have problem cutting the thicker steel.

 

[J_J]

If you think about it, you might answer your own question about tip longevity.
Every time the plasma fires, some material is eroded off the tip. You could cut hundreds of inches of metal on one arc, but if you have to cut a lot of little parts, the arc starts for each piece, so you may get 50 arcs across the tip and may not have cut many inches of metal. Torch height on the starting cut also may blow metal at the tip and distort the opening, which should be a perfect round hole. Might even try a smaller tip size.