Water jet cutting

Water jet cutting belongs the cold cutting processes and enables the separation of sheet metal from a wide variety of materials such as steel, stainless steel or aluminium in thicknesses of up to 200 mm. In contrast to the thermal cutting processes such as oxy-fuel cutting, plasma cutting or laser cutting, no heat is exerted on the cutting zone when cutting with a water jet. In this way, very tight tolerances can be precisely cut without changing the structure or hardening the edge zones. Subsequent mechanical processing is usually not necessary. Another plus: the cleanliness of the cut surfaces – almost without cutting burr.

In water jet cutting, water is directed onto the sheet to be cut using a hydraulic pump with a very high pressure of up to over 6500 bar. Quartz sand, garnet and corundum are mostly used as abrasives. The cutting accuracy is mainly controlled by the speed.