[Adam] was the lead mechanical designer on this amazing project, and he designed the fully waterproof XY gantry, capable of withstanding the water and abrasive from the cutter. The entire machine is only 2′ x 2′ by about 5′ tall, making it extremely portable and easy to move through doorways — and it runs off of plain old 120VAC and shop air. It is capable of cutting through up to 1/4″ aluminum and 1/8″ steel with a working area of 12″ x 14″ at a tolerance of 0.005″.
2 comments:
This is certainly an impressive accomplishment but I'm not really sure of the commercial viability of it. I have no idea what the real-world applications are and how useful it would be. The small footprint is great but the 12x14 inch working area seems a bit very small. Since he said the customer base would be universities, small businesses, and hobbyists I guess the small footprint is actually good if it is just being used to create small parts or one-off pieces. It would be cool to see this project succeed and being commercially available since I'm sure there a plenty of people out there looking for an affordable waterjet cutter.
Although it is being advertised as an affordable hobbyist-level piece of equipment, I'm not sure just how many people are going to be buying an almost $5000 waterjet cutter for recreational use. The appeal to an university is definitely great, but anything other than educational just seems a tad bit unrealistic. The small footprint and portability will definitely be a great advantage to whatever company or recreational user is buying a lower-end waterjet cutter.
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