Waterjet advice (natural materials)

[sikpoels]

Hi everybody. I am trying to get into the waterjet market to work speacially with natural materials. Countertops, stairs, walls, made by granite, marble, quartz.

I would like to know if this type of applications is profitable and any advise that people have been working in this field.

Thanks in advance !

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[bostosh]

I would like to know if this type of applications is profitable and any advise that people have been working in this field.
!

Sure it is,
beats Skil saws and diamond blades and grinders....
Where do the polished raw slabs come from? where is the quarry? how expensive
Got Cad and Cam system?
If you have the volume of work to justify purchase or lease of the machine and shop to support it.
get a financial angel from America to set it up. Get the surfboard shaping machine too.
100k ought to get it going.....

[awerby]

If you need to do fancy cuts, it's the way to go. But for straight ones, the kind normally used for countertops, etc. a saw would be just as fast, and a whole lot cheaper to buy and maintain. It's hard to say if you'll make money with a waterjet, but it will certainly cost some money to get started. If I were setting up a stone fabrication shop, it would not be the first thing I'd buy - that would be the material-handling equipment. Next would be a bridge saw. Then the routers, grinders, polishers needed to do edges. When the demand for curved cuts became overwhelming to the point I knew I'd pay for the machine in the first year, then I'd go for the water-jet.

I'm not sure what place a surfboard-shaping machine would have in the stone shop, unless you did a lot of surfing to wash off the stone dust. Shaping foam and shaping stone are the opposite ends of the shaping spectrum.

[sikpoels]

Thanks Andrew for your asnwer. Yeah I want to introduce the type of facy cuts like mosaics, floor medallions, logos and curved cuts for countertops as well. Thanks kind of new around where I am located.

[sikpoels]

Thanks for answer,

I want to introduce the type of facy cuts like mosaics, floor medallions, logos and curved cuts for countertops as well. Thanks kind of new around where I am located. Slabs coming from Brazil and Spain. I cant say now the volume of work support the machine but also I will lease it to give waterjet cutting service. One more question please. After waterjet cutting what type of finish the material needs? (for natural mterials). I know it depends on the speed but if I use a middle speed . It is not too muh work to give a finish polished? thanks again !

[awerby]

The cut edges are no worse than saw-cut edges (or shouldn't be). But it is a lot of work to bring any granite edge to a high polish, particularly if the edges are curved. Have you ever worked with stone before? If not, you might give it a try, just to see what you're getting into.

[suade907]

Look up a company called Creative Edge they specialize in waterjet cutting stonework for flooring applications. I've been in the business for over 20 years and they do some of the finest work I've seen. If they can do it anyone can. Our company has been cutting stringers as well as marking for layout on stairs using a 30' waterjet for that same length of time. Years ago we used to cut every part for an aluminum boat manufacture out of a 30'x8' sheet. They were the boats they used in the Chicago harbor for the police. You can pretty much do whatever you can dream up. For stonework like you mentioned the hardest part is getting the material on and off the table.