Annoying Newbie Questions

Hi All,

I'm a "wanna-be" hobby machinist who is looking to buy a ShopTask, once I'm
settled in a new house. I've been doing software development all my life but
always had an itch for mechanical creations. I've been reading through the
Shoptask Delphi List, as well as the archives of this list, but still have
some questions. It seems that machining is similar to software development
in that a project can lead to many sub-projects and sometimes you feel like
your going backwards(spending time to build tools to be able to build the
core project). I'm fine with that :-]

Probably against some of your recommendations, I would like to jump into a
CNC setup since I'm already a computer "propeller-head".

My initial project would be a miniature turbojet since R/C Jets is one of my
hobbies. I've read about the shortcomings/price of the ShopTask CNC add-on
and associated software and I'm still evaluating going the route of Tim
Goldstein with the custom CNC setup. Looking at the following link, would
it be possible to handle such a project with the ShopTask Eldorado Package
"out-of-the-box"? http://www.wren-turbines.com/MW54parts.htm

Some of the materials I would be machining with would be Aluminum, 4340
steel, Inconel, Stainless Steel, Titanium.

Thanks and sorry for the long, newbie post.

Erik Nielsen