Experimental investigation of the parameters affecting the surface roughness of materials with different thicknesses by abrasive water jetting: Polymer, composite and elastomer materials

The surface quality of various industrial products is important for end users. For this reason, it plays an important role to obtain the desired quality of the product surface in optimum time without additional operation by applying various parameters during the production phase. In this study, it was aimed to investigate the surface quality of cast polyamide 6 (PA6 G), composite (CFRP) and ethylene propylene diene manomer rubber (EPDM) materials of different thicknesses after cutting at different feed rates in abrasive water jet (AWJ). In the experiments where a total of 99 cutting operations were carried out, the effect of material type, cutting speed and material thickness on surface quality was analysed. The test specimens were cut at low, medium and high speeds determined according to the physical properties of three different polymer, composite and elastomer based materials and the surface wear roughness was measured at three different points along the depth of cut. The results obtained were then compared with the optimum cutting speeds for different materials and thicknesses. As a result, it has been shown that the cutting speed has a significant effect on the surface quality of the surface wear and the presence of machining marks on different thicknesses and different material surfaces.