What Are The Advantages of Waterjet Cutting?

Waterjet cutting offers a unique process that provides a superior cut edge while often eliminating the need for a secondary finishing process. Fast, flexible and precise, these machines offer a range of unique advantages over other metal fabrication techniques.

This blog post outlines some of the basic advantages of waterjet cutting technology.  

What exactly is waterjet cutting?

Waterjet cutting is a metal fabrication technique that combines carbide nozzles, fine garnet abrasives and high-pressure water jets to cut metal. Essentially, it is an extreme and accelerated version of the erosion that occurs in nature. Mixing waterjets with other abrasive particles helps to speed up the process.  

Waterjet Nozzles for Cleaning Parts

What are the advantages of waterjet cutting?

Waterjet cutting does not use heat

One of the most significant advantages is that waterjet cutting provides a cold cutting quality, allowing the cutting of materials that would be burned, melted or broken by other cutting methods. Waterjet cutting is a viable solution for cutting heat sensitive materials. This helps to eliminate costs due to thermal deformation of machine parts while also reducing the risk of fatigue failure due to thermal stresses caused by the process. Other thermal processes can cause surface hardening, warping and harmful gas emissions, however, waterjet machines are not subjected to thermal stresses, eliminating these undesirable consequences.

Cuts virtually any material

Waterjet cutting is the process of cutting materials with a high-pressure waterjet. For example, waterjet cutting is used in aerospace and vehicle workshops to efficiently cut shapes and parts. For very hard materials, granular abrasives are added to the water jet to increase the cutting force. Almost any material can be cut using a waterjet cutting machine. For example, plastics, metals such as steel, alloys, titanium and copper, rubber, glass, concrete, ceramics and stone.

Waterjet Cutting Spare Parts

Offers the ability to cut complex shapes

Waterjet cutting is particularly beneficial for projects where complex shapes need to be cut. Materials can be cut to any shape. Sharp corners, bevels, perforations and shapes with minimal internal radii are all possible. Stacking, nesting and lapping optimise the material and significantly reduce cutting times.

Waterjets are environmentally friendly

Waterjets produce virtually no hazardous waste. This inevitably helps to reduce waste disposal costs. Highly skilled operators can cut large pieces of reusable scrap metal that might be lost using conventional cutting methods. In addition to this, waterjet cutting allows parts to be closely nested to maximise material utilisation, saving material by minimising kerfing.

Waterjets also use less water than you might think, as the water used can be recycled using a closed-loop system. The waste water is usually clean enough to be filtered and discharged into the sewer

Here are some other advantages of using waterjet cutting in your next metal fabrication project.

Easy integration into a flexible production system

Suitable for automated contouring systems

Simple programming using standard CAD/CAM systems

Allows for rapid prototyping

Cuts multiple layers of material

No pressure effects

Faster than many conventional cutting tools

The ultra-high pressure water jet products produced by Hairan have obtained more than 20 national patent certificates, which are widely used in planar 3-axis and 5-axis waterjets, automotive interior ABB cutting, cleaning, ultra-high pressure HPP sterilization technology, ships, aviation and other industries.