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The Waterjet Masters: Mohamed Hashish

What makes a technology take hold?  Technologies come and go; even some that seemed so permanent at the time, such as kerosene lamps, typerwriters and record albums. One of the reasons waterjet has remained one of the fastest growing major machine tool processes in the world for the past 20 years is due to adaptability.  The waterjet process was invented in the 50’s by Dr. Norman Franz, but it didn’t begin commercial use until the 70’s with the explosion of disposable diapers (which in this case is a good thing).

Then ultrahigh-pressure water was adapted to hard material cutting (metal, stone, composites, ceramics) with the invention of the abrasive waterjet in the late 70’s, really beginning industrial use in the mid 80’s. This important technology was invented by a team of engineers and research scientists led by Dr. Mohamed Hashish.  Here is a brief excerpt of the abrasive waterjet master’s tale.

Waterjet Masters
Slitting with a Flow Waterjet
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Paper Slitting with Waterjets

My first day on the job I met Duncan Murdock.  It was 1989, and I sat in on a paper slitting meeting.  I sat and listened and learned.  Duncan was a senior tech (not a regional manager as he is today), and was clearly on top of the technology and the application.  Although he was young, he explained to the engineers and designers exactly how to design the slitter’s cross beam, the redundant cutting heads (to ensure 24/7 operation) the catcher tank.  He understood how the paper would flow at extremely high speed, across the top of the catcher, and how the catcher top would create the right airflow to keep the paper down and flat without billowing.

Waterjet Jobs Waterjet Masters Waterjet Slitting
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Marketing Your Waterjet: Getting the Most Out of Your Quote

In Part 1 Jessica covered marketing your waterjet on the internet.  In this second part of a two post series I will cover some basic suggestions we’ve picked up over the years from successful job shops, concentrating on maximizing the power of your quote.

Of all the collateral you have as a job shop, it could be argued that the most important is your quote.  Nothing else you create will be scrutinized as thoroughly and compared side-by-side to your competitors as often as your quote.  Is your quotation setting you up for a simple price/delivery war with your competitors, or is it separating you from the pack by showing all the value you give beyond that price and delivery?

Marketing Your Business Waterjet Jobs
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Using the Web to Market Your Waterjet

For this blog post we get into the subject of marketing your waterjet online. I’ve asked our in-house expert and global marketing communications manager Jessica Harding to give us some quick tips. Take it away, Jessica.

You might be good at making stuff with your waterjet, but not as confident at marketing your waterjet capabilities. To some the internet can be an intimidating space of hashtags, likes, keywords and Googles. Yet, when you really dig in and move past the natural mystique of what goes on in the secret algorithms within, you’ll find that if you consistently follow some simple best practices your business’s awareness will rise. Yes, it’s true, we could go on and on about how to refine your internet presence, but for today, we are going to merely touch on some powerful basics. For this post I am going to assume you already have a website up and running. If you don’t, I suggest you start there. There are numerous services available to help you build a site from scratch. No code experience necessary.

Marketing Your Business
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The Waterjet Masters: Eckhardt Ullrich

I have wanted to do this in the blog for quite a while; spotlight waterjet experts and their stories in a way that honors them for their unseen contributions, and hopefully is of high interest to those technical minded manufacturing people out there. Well, with Eckhardt Ullrich retiring last month from Flow, I felt I better get to it. Eck is a master waterjetter. He has used waterjets to mine for gold, create anchor holes in icebergs for towing, cut Boeing and Airbus composite wings….

Waterjet Masters
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Guest Post: How to Choose the Right Filters, Your Pump Will Thank You

A filter is a filter is a filter…..right? In our next post by Tim Fabian, we discuss how to choose the right filters for your pump. Now, to Tim.

A filter is a filter is a filter…..right? Not so fast.  There are so many types of filters available today it is hard to understand what all the differences are.  The important thing to remember though, is that not all will work well with your pump.  Just like the cleanliness of the water we drink needs to be clean to sustain our good health, a filter that doesn’t stop the bad stuff from getting into your pump is bad for its health too.  Even filters that have the same nominal micron value aren’t always created equal.

Pump Technology Waterjet Maintenance
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Why Not Ultrahigh-Pressure Slurry Jets?

A reader asked about Slurryjet, and why there are no ultrahigh-pressure units out there in the world today cutting in production.

First of all, let’s make sure everyone who has not studied the subject understands what we’re talking about here.  Abrasive waterjets today are created by pressurizing water, forcing it through a small jewel orifice where the pressure is converted to velocity, and then the abrasive particles are metered into a mixing chamber and accelerated like a bullet out of a rifle down the mixing tube.  Abrasive slurry jet is where a water/abrasive slurry is pressurized and pushed through an orifice.  It is inherently more efficient because the water and abrasive are going the same speed, and no momentum transfer from the water to the abrasive is taking place.

How Waterjets Work Pump Technology Waterjet Technology Overview
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When Two Cutting Heads Aren’t Better Than One

Having more than one cutting head on an abrasive waterjet should be much more productive than running one head, right?

By understanding waterjet efficiency, and the relationship between pressure and power, you can equip your shop with the most productive system possible. In short, raising the pressure and putting the power through one head is more efficient than running two heads with normal pressure.

Pump Technology Waterjet Technology Overview