Talk:Water jet cutter

Catching the water
How does the water get "caught" after it has cut? If this device can cut through almost anything, what's to stop the water jet? (Perhaps it lands in a pool of water?) —Ben FrantzDale 14:31, 29 March 2006 (UTC)
 * A pool of water is correct. There are also vertical sacrificial slats mostly submerged in the pool of water. —Ben FrantzDale 01:55, 30 March 2006 (UTC)
 * There are multiple ways to catch the water and hold the material. Some companies use ball bearings, some use metal slats, other use metal slats with additional materials (plastics, foams, etc.) for holding the material in the air. In the case of the pools of water (commonly refered to as a catcher tank), you can actually damage the tank if the jet stays in the same position for a number of hours or longer. They really do cut through anything. Engunneer 23:20, 31 October 2006 (UTC)
 * I work at a company that cuts cross link foam with water jets. We do not use abrasives, so a thick aluminum pan 6-12" below the chain the foam sits on works just fine and they only need replaced every few years.  We used to use bricks made out of corrugated plastic and those lasted about a month.  —Preceding unsigned comment added by 71.115.5.44 (talk) 04:48, 16 December 2009 (UTC)
 * I can attest to this conversation, we've cut through our tank on two occasions. There was also a ~3/8" plate of steel we were using to prevent this that it also cut through. Though we were using a big orifice, at 82ksi, with a high abrasive feed rate (lots of energy input). A big factor not yet mentioned is stand off distance. Waterjets do not maintain their ability to cut at a substantial distance. 184.0.192.146 (talk) 03:26, 30 March 2013 (UTC)

Water jets in food manufacturing?
Are the waterjets in this article the same is the ones used in food manufacturing? (For slicing cakes, bread, sandwiches...) I know some manufacturers use them because they don't have to worry about sanitation/contamination. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 24.124.29.130 (talk) 07:42, 26 January 2007 (UTC).
 * Sort of. Yes, they're the same kind of thing and operate the same way.  No, they're not exactly the same models used in "industry," as industry has different models of waterjets for different tasks.  Obviously they're not using a waterjet that will cut through a 4'x8' sheet of two inch thick steel to cut the cakes you buy at the supermarket. - Toastydeath 23:52, 26 January 2007 (UTC)
 * There are two major types of waterjets -- abrasive (AWJ) and plain. AWJs get their ability to cut from their abrasive, NOT the water. The water is simply a medium used to transfer energy to the abrasive particles. Then the particles hit a material and disintegrate it. Very little of the cutting in an AWJ is accomplished with the water.


 * However when you are cutting food, it is best to not distribute a bunch of abrasive into the food. Additionally, food tends to not be very difficult to "machine" meaning you don't need to mess with all the hassles of abrasive. As a result, a plain waterjet is used.


 * In summary, AWJs are used when you want to cut something of significant depth, or something hard to machine like aluminum or steel; plain waterjets are perfectly sufficient to cut through many foods. 184.0.192.146 (talk) 02:04, 4 May 2014 (UTC)

What's the UMR stonehenge?
and what is it doing in the article? I couldn't figure it out. 132.68.56.153 14:28, 5 June 2007 (UTC)
 * good question. I thought I had deleted it before, but I sure did this time. --Chuck Sirloin 14:57, 5 June 2007 (UTC)
 * A few years late to the party, but the UMR stonehenge was cut by waterjets. 184.0.192.146 (talk) 22:21, 2 July 2013 (UTC)

This article needs to be SI standardised.
Inches and PSI are not internationally accepted measurements and generally mean little to people outside north america. LennyValentin 04:07, 24 August 2007 (UTC)
 * I added millimetres and megapascals based on an online conversion from the imperial measurements given in the article. If someone has sourced metric figures, please replace mine. It's probably also best to leave the imperial measurements in front, certainly until there are proper metric figures. Leushenko 23:35, 13 November 2007 (UTC)
 * The pressure units were wrong. 400MPa gives 4000atm, which is impossible to obtain. The correct is 400kPa, approximately 4atm. fuchsroter 10 December 2007 —Preceding comment was added at 19:40, 10 December 2007 (UTC)
 * That is incorrect, and pressures close to atmospheric are what you get out of a Super Soaker. I have reverted it back to MPa.--Ceriel Nosforit (talk) 22:08, 12 December 2007 (UTC)

wood tool
are jet cutters really used in wood working? It seems like they would do more harm than good by exposing the wood to the abrasive medium an well as saturating the part with water.Boatman666 (talk) 22:32, 22 January 2008 (UTC)


 * Depending on the type of wood, it does not absorb much water. The abrasive material is equivalent to using sandpaper. Letting the wood dry out properly restores it to good condition. Engunneer (talk) 20:40, 23 May 2008 (UTC)--

Merge from Waterjet cuttinghead
There's a new article titled Waterjet cuttinghead. It's quite short. I'd like to suggest that the material, if deemed useful, be merged into the main article here rather than being maintained as a separate article.
 * I just changed the page to redirect to this one. That page had zero content in three sentences, so I don't think anything was lost. —Ben FrantzDale (talk) 00:10, 23 July 2008 (UTC)

Materials that cannot be cut
"Materials that cannot be cut with waterjet are tempered glass, diamonds and certain ceramics"

Is it worth stating why these materials cannot be cut with a waterjet? If anyone knows... —Preceding unsigned comment added by Jez 006 (talk • contribs) 02:30, 4 February 2010 (UTC)


 * Tempered glass has internal stresses that cause it to fracture violently when pierced. Diamonds are even harder than garnet, and so they would be very difficult to cut, although perhaps with special (industrial diamond?) abrasives it would be possible. I would fathom that ceramics could be either - some might be too brittle to cut without damaging, and some might be too hard.


 * There's other materials that a waterjet can't cut, of course. For example, materials that are damaged by water (like paper). When you try to cut MDF board on a waterjet, the pressure can sometimes cause the material to delaminate unless countermeasures are taken. Iron and steel can be cut without rusting though, as long as they're dried off afterward.--JB Gnome (talk) 22:56, 30 July 2010 (UTC)

Slight problem with the wording in one of the images.
"... An abrasive water-jet cutter puts the final cuts on a special tool ... ". A "special tool"? Please! It's a spanner !!! (wrench?). What was that previous comment about needing a more authoritative source? Looks like we need that here. Old_Wombat (talk) 09:04, 7 September 2011 (UTC)


 * I changed the subjective phrase "special tool" to the more objective phrase "metal tool". -- Burnishe (talk) 23:09, 9 December 2012 (UTC)

Nozzle
If the water is at high enough pressures to cut through basically anything, what prevents the jet from eroding the nozzle? 124.149.178.14 (talk) 12:55, 4 August 2012 (UTC)


 * It's not the pressure (which is isotropic) that cuts, it's the momentum (which has a direction). So the cutting happens "ahead" of the nozzle, where the jet impacts upon the workpiece, not alongside, to the sidewalls of the nozzle. There is some nozzle wear, true, but this is handled by making the nozzles from hard-wearing materials, such as ceramics or even artificial sapphire (which is cheaper than you might think). Nozzles are also easily replaceable as a consumable part. Andy Dingley (talk) 18:17, 4 August 2012 (UTC)

Removed refimprove tag from Feb 2009
I removed the refimprove tag from Feb 2009 because 24 additional references have been added to the article since that tag was added, and almost every statement in the article now includes a reference. -- Burnishe (talk) 23:26, 9 December 2012 (UTC)

Disadvantages
I think a disadvantages sections is needed. Abrasive Waterjets are self destructive, frequently needing maintenance. It's worthwhile to note that methinks. --64.4.68.234 (talk) 17:23, 29 December 2014 (UTC)

Also, the article states "Meatcutting using waterjet technology eliminates the risk of cross contamination . . .", but I imagine the aerosol generated might result in bacterial and prion contamination. Are there any sources referring to this potential disadvantage, either in the context of food processing or other applications?Plantsurfer (talk) 11:40, 9 March 2015 (UTC)

Oops, too many double quotes removed
While making other corrections I think I may have removed a few too many double quotes in the references while cleaning up. The document was littered with opening quotes, double quotes, smart quotes, inverted commas and what not. The usage in the references was especially erratic so I deleted a bunch. Perhaps they could all be robot corrected back to the correct type if there is a standard for references. I noticed the reference I placed got quotes when using the cite web template tool.

Please do not revert the other changes, they were much needed.

Idyllic press (talk) 21:39, 18 July 2015 (UTC)