RE: LONGEVITY plasma cutter!
We have two at the shop I work at but they are not that brand. We cut heavy guage cor-ten steel with it mostly but it will cut up to 1/2 inch steel plate w/o too much trouble. The cut is not a clean cut and the steel has to be ground to the finished shape. I have worked with CNC machines using a plasma cutter and they make a much nicer cut but that's a lot more expensive and complex set-up. I would not want to try to make small parts freehand. The cutters at the shop do not use a bottled gas, just high pressure (120psi or so) compressed air. We run them off the shop air lines