"Pete C." wrote in message
ster.com...

Bob La Londe wrote:

"Jon Elson" wrote in message
...
Bob La Londe wrote:
Anybody here play with this kind of cutter? What kind of water
pressures
does it take? How is the nozzle shaped internally? What kind of
thickness can you cut? What kind of volume of water does it move?



Typical units use about 40,000 to 50,000 PSI, and maybe half a
gallon/minute. The water is loaded with garnet grit to do the actual
cutting. I watched a demo of cutting 1/2" diameter holes through a 4"
block of Inconel, which was really quite impressive. It took maybe 2
minutes for each hole.

Yeah, that's the kind of pressure I am seeing too. Looks like there is
no
poor man's DIY setup for that either.

You can use a normal pressure washer pump (1,500-5,000 PSI) to make a
poor man's non abrasive water jet cutter... just like they use for
cutting cakes and similar in some bakery facilities. I'm not sure how
much use there is for a home CNC water jet cake cutter however.

It looks like more effort than it would be worth. I covered non-traditional
machining for _American Machinist_ a few decades ago and I remember the cake
slicers that would also cut metal. Amazing.

--
Ed Huntress