I've been neglecting updates for a while but there isn't really much aside from routine assembly.
I had some trouble with the electronics. The stock Retina Engrave board from FSE outputs some pulses at 1us and some at 5us which wasn't fully compatible with my Keling 4020 drivers.
They were quite helpful and wrote a special firmware version that fixes the problem. Although it took a bit of time to fix, my machine now works very well in both engrave and vector mode.
It seems fitting that my machine makes its own last pieces so here it is cutting out the brackets to mount the gas springs:

Cut quality is great, 6% speed 100% power (15mA).



There has been a lot of small things added to the machine and a few more I need to add as well. I've got a reed switch activated by the lid so that the laser goes off and a light goes on when the lid is opened. I have a seperate pic 12f683 running the Z-axis off one of the switches so it is easy to adjust. There is red dot aiming and a 3W led on the carriage so it is easy to line up.
The blue LCD on the lid shows the current running through the tube. By some freak accident of Chinese manufacturing, the display was improperly calibrated and shows 15mA as 10mA. I've set my maximum to 15 (as per FSE recommendation) so if I put tape over the dot it reads 0-100% power which is pretty snazzy.
Currently air assist and the water pump are wired seperately (plugged into the wall). I've got the switches mounted so I just need to wire them up.
The main addition i am waiting on is ventilation. I am going to have to move the machine to its final location (to be decided, but probably downstairs which is going to be awful to move) and I'll wire everything up once I'm there.
All said and done I am quite satisfied with my build. A few pointers to those who are thinking of doing their own:
Use polulu drivers, at 13$ a pop you save a lot of cash over kelings.
Make sure the L-brackets for the extrusions are on
really tight. If they are only somewhat tight they can twist/slide.
I am pleased with my decision to use a honeycomb table, when cutting acrylic you can see the smoke shoot through the cut.
If you have a computer with a parallel port, give mach3 or emc2 a shot. It is quite easy to use and can save you a lot of money compared retina engrave or the dsp controller.
Use locktight on all the pulleys. Make sure that setscrew is really really tight.
With what I know now I could probably do a 2.0 build for around 1000$ (this one ended in the 2500$ range).
Although it was more expensive, I am happy with my purchase of Retina Engrave. Once I got the quirks worked out it is very easy - Open literally any program, do some doodles or type some text and press print. The software can arrange the cuts in any combination of power and speed as well as engraving very well.
I saw some hexagons on the internet and figured I could make my own. A few minutes in inkscape and I have a pile to play with:

Its a great tool to have. Things that would take me hours to do by hand are a few minutes away and are perfectly accurate.
Thats pretty much it.