Wazer Desktop Waterjet

About the Machine

Waterjet cutting works by focusing an extremely high-pressure stream of water through a small orifice, mixing it with abrasive garnet particles, and directing the jet at the workpiece. The abrasive particles erode the material along the programmed path, a purely mechanical process with no heat involved.

Because there's no heat, there's no heat-affected zone (HAZ); the material along the cut edge retains its original properties. This makes waterjet the right choice for heat-sensitive materials, hardened metals, composites, and parts that can't tolerate any thermal distortion.

The Wazer's desktop footprint makes it accessible in a makerspace environment while still cutting the same materials as industrial-scale waterjet systems, just at a smaller bed size.

What Students Learn

• Waterjet physics: how abrasive garnet + high-pressure water cuts virtually any material
• Material-agnostic workflow: the same setup cuts aluminum, carbon fiber, and tile
• File preparation: DXF/SVG import and cut parameter selection
• Abrasive hopper setup and flow rate management
• Tolerancing for waterjet: edge finish, taper angle, kerf width
• Cold cutting advantages: no HAZ, no material hardening, no deformation
• Comparing waterjet to plasma and laser for a given application