ABSTRACT
The objective of this work is the investigation of a new way to recycle the GMA Australian garnet abrasive, the most commonly used in abrasive water jet cutting process, in order to increase the profit for the companies that work with abrasive water jet cutting technique. First of all the specific cutting cost for the Abrasive Water Jet Cutting when cutting with recycled abrasive has been defined, then, the reusability of the GMA garnet, after cutting steel with a water pressure of 360 MPa, has been investigated according to the principle of recycling with the minimum particle size.
Without using any commercial recycling system, the recycling process has been done by collecting and sieving the abrasive with an exacting hand work. The recycled abrasive samples have been recharged with new GMA garnet in order to improve the cutting performance whose quantification was another important objective. The experiments on the maximum achievable depth of cut have shown that both the recycled and recharged abrasive samples perform better than new GMA probably because the particles, observed through an optical microscope, are sharper than new GMA. The best performing sample has been the one with a screening size value of 90µm; the screening of the smaller particles allow to reuse the abrasive for at least three times without losing cutting capability, as appeared from the tests on multiple recycling. The cutting quality, measured through the surface roughness and waviness, of the recharged and recycled abrasives has been better than when cutting with new GMA. Finally, the cost calculation has shown that Abrasive Water Jet companies can save from 10 to 18% on the specific cutting cost of AWJC, depending on the set-up of the AWJC machine and the working load of the companies.
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