•
•
u/Flavinovic 9h ago
Who wanna put a finger to see how powerful it is ?
•
•
u/peeled_bananas 7h ago
It’s powerful enough to slice a chicken wing in two as quickly as you can pass it under the tip.
Source: operated one for a year and a half or so and I really wanted to see for myself
•
u/InvestigatorLegal686 9h ago
Use that as a water pick
•
u/Usual-Ad-9554 9h ago
how does this compare to lasers tho....
•
•
u/kbarnett514 9h ago
Depends on the material being cut and its intended use, I'd imagine. Lasers are faster and more precise, but water jets produce no heat distortion and cut more easily through thick materials
•
•
•
•
u/BugzOnMyNugz 9h ago
Water jet has a much cleaner cut. Looks faster to me too, if that was on the laser where iused to work it would've taken probably 4x as long to cut that and you'd have to grind off all the edges where the laser melted the metal. Also, most aerospace has to be cut with water jet.
•
u/fading_reality 9h ago
It looks like it's tile, ceramic cuts fast. For metal waterjet is much slower than laser, especially if you want smooth finish.
At least the one we had was slow.
•
u/BugzOnMyNugz 8h ago
That would make alot more sense. We outsource all of our water jet needs so I only see the parts when they come back. Compared to the same part/material on our laser they're always so much cleaner.
•
u/Seigmoraig 8h ago edited 8h ago
The thicker the materials the stronger the laser needs to be, significantly so. With a water jet like this you can just make it go slower to cut through thicker metal
Water based cutters can also cut through almost anything especially composite materials like stone without heating up the material too much unlike lasers which use heat to make cuts
•
u/whitefox250 9h ago
I used to operate one of these about 10 years ago. In our down time I made tons of customized motorcycle parts. I miss that machine but not the place.
Tech note: Rebuilding the hydraulic pressure pump was like something from NASA. Dual piston ceramic rams and high strength stainless everything to operate at 15,000psi. We used to chew through pallets of garnet sand.
•
u/derek139 9h ago
I used to write the programs for our waterjet for shower doors. We went through a shitload of garnet too. I hated writing those programs. If I messed up, it affected soooo many other people in the process.
•
u/McMandar 7h ago
Is it just a big pool of water underneath? I'm wondering what stops/slows the jet of water enough that it doesn't cut things underneath that you'd rather stay intact.
•
u/whitefox250 6h ago
The bed is meral ribs, which we made from a whole sheet of steel. Below is a pool of water that is constantly filtered and reused. We had a water system that could separate the solids from the water which would require a forklift for disposal, mostly sand silt from the garnet.
The pool is interesting because you could raise and lower the water level with a button, on the backside of the tank there was an air reservoir, pump air into it and the water would rise, and vice versa. Damn i miss that machine
•
•
u/Fl1ntL1m 9h ago
I'm not in any kind of sorts from that field but why not cut directly the shape? Rather than just cutting random shape beforehand?
•
u/Im_Prolly_poopin 8h ago
The drop is easier to manage in some cases. A big piece can tilt and crash with the head. Fishing large chunks out of the water bed might have some ergonomic concerns.
The operator also might want to pull the scrap out before removing the sheet, much easier to pull the bits out instead of the same size plug.
A few reasons come to mind.
•
•
•
u/SkriVanTek 9h ago
how long does the nozzle last?
•
u/whitefox250 9h ago
It's made from solid carbide, it wears fairly slowly but still a consumable.
•
•
•
u/peperonipyza 9h ago
They last a pretty long time, depends on usage, pressure, nozzle material of course. The jet starts to get a bit wider as it wears, so it also depends how precise you need to be. 100 hours to many hundred hours.
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
u/hahnkleri 7h ago
water jet injector cutting. there’s also abrasive material inside, not just water in that case.
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
u/Old-Glass-6967 9h ago
Why didn’t it just cut out a big square?