REVIEW ARTICLE


An Investigation of Surface Quality Cut by Abrasive Water Jet



Shijin Zhang, Yuqiang Wu, Yanli Wang
College of Resources and Environmental Science, Chongqing University, Chongqing, 400030, P.R. China.


© 2010 Joe Rooney

open-access license: This is an open access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International Public License (CC-BY 4.0), a copy of which is available at: (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/legalcode). This license permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and source are credited.

* Address correspondence to this author at the College of Resources and Environmental Science, Chongqing University, Chongqing, 400030, P.R. China; E-mail: bassey69@yahoo.com


Abstract

As abrasive water jet (AWJ) starts to be used in industry, especially in aerospace and automotive industries extensively, getting high quality surface has become a major requirement. Being a promising non-traditional cutting process, AWJ is holding several deficiencies, which limits its extensive applications dramatically. One of the deficiencies is striation marks presented on AWJ cutting surface. This paper investigated the triation formation mechanism systematically. This investigation leads to a conclusion that, striation can not be eliminated completely, however, by selecting proper paramters, smooth cutting surface can be achieved. Based on that conclusion, all parameters which might affect surface roughness have been explored, and an empirical model has been built and tested. With this empirical model, predicting surface quality becomes feasible and practical.

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