 |
|
 |
Waterjet Capabilities
Above: machine any 2D shape with 1 tool. Slots, radii, holes, and profile in one 2 minute setup!
- pre hardened steel
- mild steel
- exotics like Titanium, Inconel, Hastalloy
- gummy 304 stainless
- (most steels cut at the same speed, whether hardened, or not.)
- Copper, Brass, Aluminum: They are a cinch!
- brittle materials like glass, ceramic, quartz, stone.
- laminates
- flammable materials
Cut thin stuff, or thick stuff
Make all sorts of shapes with only one tool.
Cut wide range of thickness' to reasonable tolerance up to 2" (50mm) thick
Up to 5" (127mm) or thicker where tolerance not important, or in soft materials.
No Heat Generated / No heat affected zones - this is cold cutting!
No mechanical stresses
Cut virtually any shape
Fast Setup
Only one tool to qualify / No tool changes required
Fast turn around on the machine. Make a part, then 2 minutes be making a completely different part from a completely different material.
Leaves a satin smooth finish, thus reducing secondary operations
Clean cutting process without gasses or oils
Makes its own start holes
Narrow kerf removes only a small amount of material.
Your "scrap" metal is easier to recycle or re-use (no oily chips!)
Modern systems are now very easy to learn.
You can trade off tolerance vs speed from feature to feature on your part.
Can easily switch between high production, and single piece production, on the same machine, with no extra effort.
Draw the part / cut the part. It is that easy! Everyone in your shop can learn to use it quickly.
No "scaley" edges, which makes it easier to make a high quality weld
Machine composite materials, or materials where dissimilar materials are glued together
Machine stacks of thin parts all at once.
Above: Get nice edge quality from funky materials.
(Reflective materials in particular, such as Aluminum and Copper.
Uniformity of material is not very important to an Abrasivejet.
Abrasive jets do not heat your part. Thus there is no thermal distortion or hardening of the material.
Precision abrasive jet machines can obtain about the same or higher tolerances than lasers (especially as thickness increases).
Your capital equipment costs for water jet are generally much lower than that for a laser. I.e. for the price of a laser, you can purchase several abrasivejet-machining centers.
Abrasive jets can machine thicker materials. How thick you can cut is a function of how long you are willing to wait. 2" (50mm) steel and 3" (76mm) aluminum is quite common.
I heard of people doing up to 10" (250mm) steel, and 24" (600mm) thick glass with high horsepower systems.
Once you get over 2" (50mm) thick it is very difficult to get precision, however. Lasers seem to have a maximum of 0.5" (12mm) - 0.75" (19mm).
Abrasive jets are safer. No burnt fingers, no noxious fumes, and no fires. (You still have to keep those fingers out of the beam.)
Abrasive jets are more environmentally friendly.
Maintenance on the abrasive jet nozzle is simpler than that of a laser, though probably just as frequent.
Abrasive jets are capable of similar tolerances on thin parts, and better on parts thicker than .5"
Abrasive jets do not loose much "focus" when cutting over uneven surfaces.
While lasers are often faster on thinner materials...
...it may be cheaper and faster to simply buy two or three abrasive jet machining centers to do the same work
...you can stack materials, so you are cutting multiple thin parts simultaneously.
...you can run additional cutting heads in parallel on a single machine
Modern Abrasive jets are typically much easier to operate and maintain than lasers, which means that every employee in your shop can be quickly trained to run one!
Abrasivejets don't create "scaley" edges, which makes it easier to make a high quality weld
Many shops that have lasers also have waterjets, as they are complimentary tools. Where one leaves off, the other picks up.
Above: Much faster than EDM! If you have an EDM, then you definitely have a need for a waterjet!
This means that many parts of the same catagory that an EDM would do can be done faster and cheaper on an abrasivejet, if the tolerances are not extreme.
Above: Wire EDM fixturing in an abrasivejet machining center. This makes precision fixturing possible. It also allows for pre-machining on the abrasive jet to release stresses in the material, and then use the exact same fixturing on the EDM to do secondary operations and final cutting to extreme tolerance.
Wow, that is a thin cut!
When comparing with Plasma / Fine Plasma:
Abrasivejets provide a nicer edge finish
Abrasivejets don't heat the part
Abrasivejets can cut virtually any material
Abrasivejets are more precise
Plasma is typically faster
Waterjets would make a great compliment to a plasma shop where more precision or higher quality is required, or for parts where heating is not good, or where there is a need to cut a wider range of materials.
Above: (Many) Modern machines are relatively clean and quiet.
When comparing with Flame cutting:
Abrasivejets provide a much nicer edge finish
Abrasivejets don't heat the part
Abrasivejets can cut virtually any material
Abrasivejets are more precise
Flame cutting is typically faster
Flame cutting is typically cheaper, if you can use it.
Waterjets would make a great compliment to a flame cutting where more precision or higher quality is required, or for parts where heating is not good, or where there is a need to cut a wider range of materials.
Above: Do pre-machining, and save your other tools from having to do so much work!
When comparing with milling:
There is only one tool to qualify on an abrasivejet
Setup and Fixturing typically involves placing the material on the table with an abrasivejet
Cleanup is much faster with an abrasivejet
Programming is easier and faster
Machine virtually any material, including:
- brittle materials
- pre hardened materials
- otherwise difficult materials such as Titanium, Hastalloy, Inconel, SS 304, hardened tool steel....
Waterjets are used a lot for complimenting or replacing milling operations. They are used for roughing out parts prior to milling, for replacing milling entirely, or for providing secondary machining on parts that just came off the mill. For this reason, many traditional machine shops are adding waterjet capability to provide a competitive edge.
|
|
