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Thread: Waterjet cutting

  1. #1
    Hi!

    I had some steel rocker sheets manufactured by waterjet cutting. When I started to put it in the COST document I ended up with a very high price. I thought that this was a quite cheap and fast way of manufacturing sheet metal parts.

    Am I supposed to measure the total distance travelled by the nozzle to cut the part out or is there another way?

    Any comments?

    Regards, Filip

  2. #2
    Hi!

    I had some steel rocker sheets manufactured by waterjet cutting. When I started to put it in the COST document I ended up with a very high price. I thought that this was a quite cheap and fast way of manufacturing sheet metal parts.

    Am I supposed to measure the total distance travelled by the nozzle to cut the part out or is there another way?

    Any comments?

    Regards, Filip

  3. #3
    The way we did our laser cut stuff was by length of cut. Pretty sure if you scroll to the right in the excell sheet it offers an explanation of what they want.
    J.R.
    University at Buffalo Alum.
    Safety Wire Team Leader

    "Most of the things worth doing in the world had been declared impossible before they were done."
    Louis D. Brandeis

  4. #4
    Filip,

    You are correct. Cost report counts linear distance traveled, regardless of thickness (not sure about any material multiplier necessary).

    You are also correct that it is relatively fast and cheap (and easy) relative to CNC machining, at least in the real world and not in the report.

    We have access to both CNC mills and waterjet machines. There are almost no consumables to CNC machine rockers. However, the bags of garnet abrasive that the waterjet consumes are quite expensive. We know as this is one of the only machines that our shop requires users to pay for ($80/running hour or thereabouts).
    Zhefei
    Northwestern Formula Racing


  5. #5
    Well, if you don't know that your CNC program will suddenly plunge the bit at 25 in/min then there are consumables....
    J.R.
    University at Buffalo Alum.
    Safety Wire Team Leader

    "Most of the things worth doing in the world had been declared impossible before they were done."
    Louis D. Brandeis

  6. #6
    If they indeed charge you based on linear distance, not thickness, say you stack sheets on the waterjet to cut multiple parts at once(assuming there are duplicate parts).

    I would never call waterjetting parts cheap, but it can be very cost effective for the right parts. For some materials its the only way to go. The lack of heat affected zone is a big plus in many cases (such as when secondary operations on the cut edge are required).
    Courtney Waters
    UC Davis Formula SAE Alumni

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