Very cool. Thank you for the insight @Evan Bobb! I haven’t given too much thought into the used market as I am not sure exactly what to look for in terms of wear and other variables. With the information you have provided, I will definitely take the time to look into those options. Would having a used 5th axis mill be a better option overall or should I stick to a more standard VF style 3 or 4 axis mill? What are some options you would recommend that I look for in machines (through spindle coolant, chip auger, SS vs YT vs TR, etc.)?

Gotcha, very cool @Evan Bobb! I appreciate you sending over that listing. That definitely helps put things into perspective. I have a 1400sqft shop that I use as storage and to work on my vehicles. That is already slowly being converted into a full-time fabrication/machine shop. After your comment and insight yesterday, I searched online for used HAAS machines. I found a 2021 VF4SS w/these options at, what I think, is a pretty competitive price. When starting businesses, I try my best to run as lean as possible, but I do see the value in buying a slightly more expensive used/newer-generation machine as it would save me from swallowing the depreciation of a new machine but having it be new enough to where the machine is still in the service life of parts and things. The machine featured in the attached photo has everything but the fifth axis. Initially, I was hesitant about it but I then looked into possibly investing in upgrading that machine w/ 5th axis wiring and a tr210 rotary. This would give me both 3 axis setup and 3+2 axis configurations. The only piece of information that I don't have about the VF4ss is how many hours it has been running. I am waiting to get that. I also did find deals on HAAS UMC500ss but from my preliminary research, their UMC line suffers from axis drift and other variable changing quirks. If I’m going to buy used, I am going to stick with HAAS purely for support as this would be my first machine (and used) so any help to solve problems that may arise is quintessential to keep the parts flowing lol. What I am trying wrap my head around is making the investment into a simultaneous 5th axis machine or a 3 axis machine w/and added 5th axis trunnion. My initial thought process was having a machine like a VF4ss w/5th axis is an ideal setup as it can do faster high volume production as well as rapid high precision/complexity prototyping. With the VF series comes along a bigger build plate volume that has the ability to adapt 5 axis machining where the UMC is limited to its fairly large build plate. How the VF4ss machine would fit into my business plan would be to have this as the main workhorse until we, if needed, move into a bigger/different space that could accommodate the VF4 and another machine, preferably a fully dedicated simultaneous 5 axis machining center.