Today's job shop industry demands low costs and timely part delivery to customers. If a job shop cannot meet one of those goals, that's a problem. If it can't meet either, that's trouble.

At one time, Alloy Products Corp, Waukesha, WI, sent out parts for laser cutting, a process the company discovered was too expensive and resulted in delays in part delivery to customers. In order to remain competitive, Alloy Products had to find a way to contain costs, eliminate long delays in delivery, and have more control over production schedules. The company ultimately found a way to accomplish all of these by switching to ultrahigh-pressure waterjet technology.

Using Flow Int'l Corp's Bengal 4x4 abrasive waterjet cutting system, displayed here, Alloy Products has succeeded in reducing the cost of leadtime and deliveries to customers.

Alloy Products manufactures stainless steel pressure vessels and custom parts for customers in the pharmaceutical, semiconductor, and chemical industries. Some projects involve cutting 36´´x36´´ stainless from thicknesses of ¹/_⁸´´ to ¹/_²´´, at heights of 5´´ to 8´´, to tolerances of 0.005 and 0.007. The cutting process must be able to handle the slopes of the domed cylinder heads, which measure up to 48´´ in dia, without washing out when cutting the slopes. This made the projects demanding. When the search began for a new system, the three most important factors were cutting speeds, ease of setup, and lower operating costs.

Peter El-Sabally, director of engineering, read about abrasive waterjet cutting in trade magazines. To research the technology further, he approached Schweda Machinery, a local distributor of waterjet machines, where he saw a demonstration of the Bengal 4x4 abrasive waterjet cutting system from Flow Int'l Corp. Mr El-Sabaaly liked the demonstration and proceeded with test cuts and analysis. When Schweda test cut the cylinder, Mr El-Sabaaly found that the speed, accuracy, and surface finish of the waterjets was superior to other proposed solutions, and decided to purchase the system.

Abrasive waterjet cutting uses water pressurized to 50,000 psi, with a garnet abrasive entrained in the jet stream. The water is forced through a precision orifice 0.010´´ in dia. The water and abrasive mixture quickly and precisely cut materials with accuracies of ±0.005´´. A cold-cutting tool, abrasive waterjet leaves a surface free of a heat-affected zone (HAZ). By eliminating HAZ, abrasive waterjet users save time and money previously spent on secondary operations. Cutting without heat protects against metallurgical changes, leaving the material structure of the part intact. Waterjets can also be a more cost-effective alternative because jobs that may normally take an hour to complete can be cut in minutes.

In December 1997, Alloy Products Corp implemented the Bengal system, with a Paser 3 cutting head and the FlowMaster PC-based software program. The system is a fully integrated machine tool that cuts complex, 2D shapes out of virtually any material. The Windows-based controller is developed specifically for abrasivejet cutting and is preprogrammed with cutting parameters for a wide variety of materials to dramatically simplify waterjet machining. To produce parts from a DXF or CAD file, users select the material type and thickness and click on icons to execute waterjet commands. With point and click technology and with no special knowledge of abrasive waterjet machining or CNC programming necessary, the controller determines optimum cutting parameters for the application.

Before implementing the waterjets, Mr El-Sabaaly said parts cut with traditional processes required deburring of the edges. However, parts cut using the waterjets do not require secondary processing, so jobs that used to take 15 min to cut are now completed in less than a minute.

In the months since installing the waterjets into its operations, Alloy Products not only has reached its goals, but it has exceeded them with other jobs for the machine.

For more information visit Flow Int'l Corp

Buckley Owens Machinery Corp. 6416 Fly Road | East Syracuse, New York 13057 Telephone 315.432.0708 Fax 315.432.0736 Email: info@buckleyowens.com