Shopbot vs Spartan

Hi community,

Newbie here looking for some recommendations or pointers. My university(UK) just approved the purchase of a CNC machine for our Musical Instrument Design courses. A friend had recommended the Shopbot PRSalpha (https://www.shopbottools.com/products/alpha) as a solid option. I have heard good things about shopbot from my searches but one of its main selling points (designed, built, and supported in the USA) concerns me a bit. Not sure if

I recently came across The Spartan available from Mantech Machinery (https://mantechmachinery.co.uk/cnc-routers-entry-level). The specs on the machine look great but I had never heard from the brand and am still waiting for a quote (might cost far more than the shopbot). I guess the main attraction of this machine is the UK based distribution and service.

So this is indedd one of those 'What machine should I buy?' posts. Or any other machine that might be a better option?

The specifics being:

• 1300 x 1300 mm bed size (4' x 4' absolute minimum) slightly bigger is possible
• Main use to make music instruments (mostly wood).
• Option to cut aluminium or other soft metals would be welcome but not essential.
• Robust enough (no home made kit) but it wouldn't run constantly as it would in a commercial setting.
• Good UK support (specifically Northern Ireland).
• Budget around £30K, option to increase for full installation, starter set of accessories, dust extraction.

Is there anything important I might be missing?

As mentioned above, this would be for a maker space that my department is building and not for commercial production but ideally would be something solid that doesn't require constant tinkering.

Any advise is really appreciated.

Cheers!

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