I had made up my mind on a dragon wagon but seeing that they are out of stock I’m considering getting a pro kit table. My main concern is that it isn’t as ridgid and I’m wondering if anyone has any data or subjective comparison on them? I haven’t seen any crazy 3d assemblies done on a pro kit table in the fireball videos. I was also hoping my fixture table could double duty as a reference flat plate for my non welding projects.
Have not really had a chance to use my pro table yet, but for your non welding projects, how flat does flat need to be, and how big do you need it to be? For building my 3D printers, I was able to get a piece of scrap granite countertop from a local counter place. They had a whole scrap pile to choose from, didn’t cost me anything. Short of having a legit surface plate, you’re not going to get much flatter than that.
I guess I don’t know. I’m just trying to plan my space usage well and I was impressed by how flat the cast table tops are in the videos. That’s what brought me here over langmuir. To clarify, my understanding is that the pro kit table isn’t any less flat, it’s more that they are less Ridgid and I’m trying to figure out if they are Ridgid enough. I’ll keep your granite countertop idea in my back pocket.
It seems pretty rigid to me, but in a recent thread Jason was pretty insistent that the plate needs to be supported by a welded triangle while welding up the base structure, rather than just supported at 3 points on the sawhorses. So apparently it can deflect some, and best rigidity and flatness are going to depend a lot on the structure you build, and how well you adjust the set screws and straps.
I have not been able to adjust mine yet, because Fireball appears to have changed the design of the 54x30 pro plate and added the fastener locations for an additional cross member, and also additional set screw points. I had ordered the strap kit for the 54x30 table which had apparently not been updated to match, so I don’t have all the stuff I need yet (Fireball is sending me the rest).
What size of Dragon Wagon were you looking at getting? They appear to still have a handful of blem 3’x2’ units available currently.
Looking at the larger one. It was honestly really hard to decide between the dragon wagon and a larger 6’x3’ pro kit. At this point I’m mostly a hobbyist who may or may not make money with these tools. I think rigidity and holes on the sides wins in the end as that seems like the lifelong no regrets option.
Yeah that makes a lot of sense if you’re coming at it from the angle of wanting the DW as your base position. I don’t think the Pro kit is really meant for somebody who is already sold on the benefits of the fixture table, and you may be better off to wait until the table you actually want is in stock.
The Pro table seems to be more for somebody like me, who really just wanted something flat to build on. I have struggled for years to weld projects straight without having a good base to build from… Many of those years I was in a shop with a horrible floor, and no space for a real welding table. The only welding table I had was one that could be taken down and stored when not in use, which was honestly fine for most of the stuff I needed to do, which was small weldments that would typically each have their own dedicated jig. For my current project, I have a couple of larger pieces that really do need to be held flat. I looked at getting a piece of heavy plate and building a table, and compared to the cost and effort of that, the Pro table seemed to be a good deal. It’s already been ground flat and machined for easy mounting, which is a huge win for me since I don’t have to try to build a perfect substructure that can force a regular piece of heavy plate into flat. The ability to take fixtures is just a bonus that isn’t really necessary for my current needs. The coating is kind of nice too.
IMO, the Pro table is as much a marketing tool as it is a product. Had I built a more traditional welding table using a piece of heavy plate for the top, I would have no need to purchase any fixtures to go with it. The real marketing genius is how the first thing you do with the Pro plate, is use it to build it’s own substructure… With the way everything goes together, the builder will suddenly “get it” in a way that they won’t just from watching the videos. The first thing I did with mine, was to set up a series of fixtures and clamps to weld the feet to my legs (I bought my steel locally and used 2" square tube for the legs, and different casters). And the first thought through my head, was where has this thing been all my life? For purposes of the table, it really doesn’t matter that the mounting plates for the casters are all perfectly centered identically, but it did hammer home in a very real way, what the system is capable of. Which is something I can really appreciate as an OCD aircraft mechanic.
So yeah, I’m now 100% sold on the system, when my real goal initially was to just get something flat to build a couple of critical parts on. For me, something like the Dragon Wagon in the same size wasn’t a thing I would have ever considered. But now, if I ever take on enough actual paying work in my home shop to need another or bigger welding table, then absolutely I would. Which is why I say it’s a marketing tool as much as it is a product. I designed and built a piece of equipment for my employer a few years ago, and I wish I’d had something like this available to me then. It would have saved me a lot of time.
One other thing I have discovered about the fixture table, is it can wring some additional benefit out of the machining capability that I have. In my current shop, I finally had room to add a lathe and a milling machine. I wind up doing a lot of stuff on the mill that doesn’t really need to be done on the mill, partly for precision and ease, and partly to keep grinding dust out of my shop (i.e. I will mill stuff to size that before, I would have used a grinder or belt sander). My old shop got super nasty with the dust, and I go to lengths to avoid it now. Before the fixture plate, the precision achieved was often just a byproduct of reducing the dust in my shop, Now, if I am assembling the pieces on the fixture table, there’s a real benefit to having identical parts be truly identical.
You might be right. I wouldn’t be surprised if the pro kit table or even all the tables are a loss leader to sell the tooling. Jason responded to me in another thread and suggested I call customer service where you can backorder. I now have a 4.5x2.5 DW kit with fixturing on order and my wallet is 6k lighter.
I know how you feel trying to weld accurately without a good table. I’ve always liked welding but always hated trying to get assemblies to be straight with all the weld pull. My current table is a 2’x2’ 1/8" aluminum plate on a cardboard box… So I’m expecting this to be like going from my 14 year old homemade 3d printer to a Bambu lab a couple years ago.
Side note funny you are an aircraft mechanic. I was one as well for a bit and now I’m an R&D engineer during the day. I’m also working on adding various other capabilities to my shop like milling, lathing, and CNC cutting. Tbh the pro kit table probably would have made me very happy coming from nothing, especially given your glowing review. I just decided I’d probably want an upgrade down the road so I may as well spend the money now if I can. I can’t believe I started out looking at harbor freight tables and here I am…this always happens.
So many people getting Bambuzled these days… 
Anyway, if you’re into Gridfinity, you can do a search on my username on Printables and see a bunch of organizers I came up with for some of the Fireball fixtures. There’s also a thread on this forum with links to them, and organizers by other users.
Edit to add; at least there is no harbor freight in Alaska, so I don’t have any of their stuff. If I am going to the trouble and expense of having something shipped up by barge, I’m not going to go with “race to the bottom” equipment. Funny thing is, I was originally looking at getting just a benchtop lathe and a small mill. Then my machinist/gunsmith buddy heard about it and insisted that I wouldn’t be happy with that stuff. Which is how I wound up with a 12x36 lathe and a 1965 Bridgeport. Previous manager at my place of employment decided in his wisdom to get rid of the lathe and mill that we’d had, so now usually whenever we need custom tooling fabricated, I get paid to make it at home. Which has gone a long way towards offsetting the cost of the equipment.
I’m going to look for your gridfinity designs. I wasn’t sold on it until I started setting up my Carvera at work and had a table full of stuff I wanted quick access to. At my job I have the opposite “problem”. They’ll tend to buy the tools I buy once I show how useful they are. Means my job is easier but I can’t count on them for side work to pay for all this stuff.