Pressurized water energy was used as early as the beginning of the last century as one of the methods of mechanical impact on hard surfaces, in particular in coal mines – to crush coal seams with a water jet (with water hoses), and in gold mines – to wash out the rocks from the pits.
In the 1960s, this technology was used in the United States to process fiber optic materials for the aircraft industry.
But the breakthrough in the practical application of waterjet cutting took place in 1979, when small solid particles (abrasive, or abrasive sand) were added to the water jet fed under ultra-high pressure. The essence of the process is to tear off and remove microparticles of the processed material from the cutting cavity by a high-speed stream of water-abrasive. Simply put, the cutting is done by exposing the machined material to a water jet with solid particles, under ultra-high pressure. The effectiveness of a two-component jet consisting of water and abrasive is achieved by optimally selecting a variety of cutting parameters: water pressure and flow rate; abrasive flow rate and particle size
The above technology allowed to sharply increase the cutting properties of the water jet and significantly expand the range of application and the list of materials to be processed (such as: metals and their alloys, stone, composite and multi-layer materials, etc.), and already in the early 1980s the industrial production of equipment and components for waterjet cutting was started.
The above technology allowed to sharply increase the cutting properties of the water jet and significantly expand the range of application and the list of materials to be processed (such as: metals and their alloys, stone, composite and multi-layer materials, etc.), and already in the early 1980s the industrial production of equipment and components for waterjet cutting was started.
Abrasive waterjet cutting is environmentally friendly and absolutely fire-safe, since it completely eliminates the possibility of material melting and emission of harmful fumes. For many types of materials such as composites, ceramics, honeycomb and multi-layer structures, there is simply no alternative to waterjet cutting.
