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Even the most unique & difficult materials to process can be waterjet cut.
Materials that are thick or thin, hardened or soft, stressed, or malleable, coated or bare, reflective, treated, laminated, brittle, organic, or synthetic, conductive or non-conductive, heat resistive or heat sensitive are all perfect candidates for abrasive waterjet cutting.
From composites to acrylics, ceramics to metals, foams, rubbers, honeycombs, glass to fiberglass, granite, cement, marble, tile and wood. Even exotics are easy such as; G10, Kevlar, Carbon Fiber, Mylar, Plastics, Polyethylene, Polyimide, and Niobium and more.
Each material type has its own characteristics and must be handled in its own unique way. MILCO has perfected these adjustments and modifications. With our numerous years of waterjet experience MILCO has the expertise you require for your order.
Why Use Waterjet?
Waterjet Cutting for Thick and Thin Materials
MILCO waterjet has the ability to cut material thicknesses from ultra-thin shim stock and foil; all the way to 10” thick steel plates. As material thickness increases, waterjet tends to become the preferred cutting method, especially when accuracy must be maintained. However, we specialize in cutting very thin material as well, (down to .005” thickness).
Waterjet Cutting Is Ideal For Stressed Metals
When a load is applied to metal, the atomic structure itself is stressed, shaped, strained, pulled, compressed, warped or extended. The waterjet cutting process has no discrimination in cutting these types of metals or any material with any of these stresses within it. Even if material has stresses placed in it from another process such as welding, heat treating, bending or grinding.
Hardened or Soft Metal Waterjet
We can contour our nozzle settings to perfectly fit the variable for material hardness. Due to the nature of waterjet, the pressure setting and speed of the nozzle movement are all manipulated.
Organic or Synthetic Waterjet Cutting
MILCO has cut everything from natural slate to leather. This leaves many options open to designers because there are less limitations as to what they can cut.
Coated or Bare Metal Can Be Cut With Our Machinery
There are a wide variety of different types of coatings, such as: powder coating, chroming, anodizing, ceramic-coating, plastic-coating, plating, cellulosic, UV coating and PVC-coating. None of these coatings or platings creates a problem for the waterjet to cut through no matter how thick they are. This alleviates the problem of having customers parts plated before or after the abrasive waterjet cutting process.
Brittle or Flexible Materials Can Be Cut
Materials that are brittle such as acrylic, stone, ceramic and glass can easily be waterjet cut. Piercing on top of the material may cause slight chipping which can be alleviated by pre-drilling the material, piercing at reduced pressure or starting the cut off of the material. Even materials that are on the flexible side of the spectrum such as rubber, foam, vct, tile, masonite, wood, and lexan have their own characteristics and can be easily cut with different settings and without abrasive in the waterjet mix to increase the quality of the cut.
Positive Reflections Are No Problem for Waterjet Cutting
Because of its reflectivity, some materials such as copper and aluminum are very difficult to laser cut. Reflective materials, no matter what polish or finish is on the material prove to be easily cut on the waterjet machine reflective materials are cut without discoloration, but there may be a slight frosting along the cut. This is usually not significant enough to require masking.
Waterjet Heat Sensitive Materials
Heat sensitive and heat resisting materials such as stainless steel, alloy steel, titanium, Inconel and hastelloy can be cut with no material effects. Slight distortion may occur from residual stresses already present inside the material. With materials thicker than .250”, the edge finish and cut accuracy are far greater than any other heat or laser cutting methods. There is no burr or slag that would require secondary machining operations to remove.
One material that cannot be cut with a waterjet is tempered glass. Since tempered glass is designed and engineered under stress, when you begin to cut it, it will shatter into small fragments.
Conductive or Non-Conductive
With Wire EDM, if material was not conductive it could not be machined due to the fact that it needed electrical current to pass through the work piece in order to be machined. This is not the case for Waterjet Cutting. Insulated materials such as rubber and plastics can be as easily machined as metals.
