What are the longest cutters that could work in a Nomad3?
I realise it depends on material type, type of cut, cutter diameter etc.
I want to do some really deep pockets in hardwood. MRR not really
important to me, neither is cutter diameter. This is my immediate
use-case but if people can chip in with other examples the forums
make a great reference 
The nomad has about 3 inches from the bottom of z axis to the cabinet bottom. Subtract 5/8 for the moving bed leaves 2 3/8 for material (picture has an extra waste board)…
The Z axis goes low enough that nearly all bits will reach the bottom. A really long bit might actually limit you in that the Z axes couldn’t go high enough to give your material clearance room.
The Nomad has little Z clearance, and then it is also very wasteful with it. You have the non-removable bed, then the wasteboard, threaded table or vise, then your stock. That leaves little clearance on top.
In addition to that, there are two things that make using longer tools difficult.
One is that Carbide Motion insists on doing tool changes right over your workpiece, which is simply impossible if your tool is long (I reported this as a problem recently, not sure if it got any attention). You can’t jog the machine when it’s paused for a tool change, so if you can’t remove the tool, you are stuck.
The second reason is that you need to very carefully manage your heights, because any mistake is costly: Carbide Motion will panic if the Z limit switch is hit. It will abort and all your work so far will be wasted, because there is no easy way to restart. This is of course noticeable if you use a longer tool further down the road. If you start with one, it will abort quickly.
Anyway — I found that the longest tool I can practically use is a 60mm endmill, which extends 42mm below the holder. I still can’t do tool changes (unless I’m lucky and I end up with a deep pocket just below the place where Carbide Motion chooses to do the tool change), but it does work.
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