Just thought I'd post a minor update. So far I have cut both my motor mounting brackets, both exhaust flanges, and also made a few cuts on the square tubing for my exhaust manifolds. I'm getting steadier with my cuts as I get more practice.

A couple of techniques I'd found that help are 1) use my free hand to help steady and guide the torch, and 2) when following a paint-pen line drawn on a piece of steel it helps to tilt the torch so that the plasma jet is pointed in the direction I want to cut. Kind of "push" cutting rather than actual "drag" cutting. This allows me to see both the line and exactly where the jet is cutting a lot better - helping me to stay more precisely on the line.

Is there any disadvantage to this "push" cutting technique? It isn't going to cause me to wear out tips faster or anything like that, is it?