Dumb questions from a future customer--

I suspect that this question has already been asked somewhere, and I just can't find it...

I am waiting for the CarveWright branded machines to become available (I'm waiting out the Sears rush), but have some questions that might be easy for someone who has a machine.

I know that the minimum workpiece size is 1/2" tall, however a lot of what I do involves cutouts and work on thinner wood (typically 1/4"). I know that I can work on this wood if I jig it to the appropriate height, however, I want to know if I should input the correct height of the boardin designer, or would this cause a problem given the minimum height requirement.

Second, assuming that I can input the correct board height into designer and use the pattern, will be cutout tool properly leave tabs in place on the 1/4" wood?

Third, does anyone know when an announcement about what features the "Pro" version of the designer software will be made? I'm wondering if it will allow a way to do v-carved photos similar to (or imported from, I suppose) PhotoVCarve (the image darkness is determined by the depth of a v-cut, allowing a rasterized look rather than a relief cut):
http://www.vectric.com/
It just seems that this might be a good solution for some of the folks trying to carve photos.

I'm just sad that my designer evaluation will expire before I get a machine. :-(

151,

It depends upon who you talk to, as originally the minimum thickness was 1/2", however, somewhere along the line 1/4" became the thickness. Some of the CW people (ahem, Bard) still claim that it's 1/2". Having said that, I personally still use a jig for 1/4" thick boards, because if it's not at least 1/4' when measured by the machine it's going to block the project. However .... note that you can give your project a 1/4" thickness in Designer and it won't nag you about it being below the limit.

Bob Hill
Tampa Florida

Thanks for the answer.

Now all I have to do is fight the urge to march down to Sears (I might lose that fight), since I only have ten days left on Designer, and have grown addicted to designing stuff.

-Eric