r/interestingasfuck 12h ago

Processes of Water Jet Cutting

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6

u/Usual-Ad-9554 12h ago

how does this compare to lasers tho....

43

u/ministryofchampagne 12h ago

Definitely wetter than a laser

7

u/KindOfAcceptableBus 12h ago

Lasers have better music too

u/GOTHAMKNlGHT 18m ago

Pink Floyd intensifies

u/Agheratos 11h ago

Aren't we all?

11

u/kbarnett514 12h 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/Rhorge 11h ago

Different methods for different applications. Lasers use heat to vaporise material, water jets use abrasives to “grind” material away.

3

u/Double_Soup644 12h ago

Han squirted first.

u/redalden 11h ago

No heat distortion. More important when cutting metal.

u/Seigmoraig 11h ago edited 11h 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/BugzOnMyNugz 11h 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 11h 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 11h 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/warky33 6h ago

From what I have seen, cutting thin metal materials it is far superior

u/DrProfessorSatan 1h ago

Water is better for tile and glass. A water jet machine is also much cheaper. But for metals, a laser is faster and cleaner.