Shape distortion reduction method for abrasive water jet (AWJ) cutting

The aim of this study is to test a theoretical model for calculating abrasive water jet (AWJ) cutting parameters in order to reduce the shape deformation in curved cutting trajectories. Experimental results were produced using commercial AWJ machines. Despite the limitations of these commercial AWJ machines in terms of both software and hardware, the comparison of calculated and experimental results showed a sufficient correspondence between the theoretical and experimental data sets, with the difference lying within the range of measurement uncertainty. The difference between theoretical and experimental results is up to 2.5 %, similarly to the combined measurement uncertainty. The maximum deviations of the measured values from the calculated averages are up to 0.2 mm and the measuring device uncertainty is up to 0.1 mm. A method aimed at reducing the shape distortion caused by AWJ in curved geometric features is suggested and tested. It was unambiguously demonstrated that the jet markedly reduces the shape deformation in curved geometric features when it is tilted according to the proposed method. Such an error compensation procedure can be already applied on commercial machines.