Preliminary study on occurrence of composite material delamination processed by abrasive water jet cutting

Abstract

The paper presents a preliminary experimental study on processing composite materials (CFRP) using abrasive water jet cutting (AWJC) process, analysing the possibilities of occurrence of material delamination. AWJC is a proper solution for cutting CFRP because of reduced interface temperature, high flexibility, low mechanical loading and reduced cutting forces. Cutting CFRP using AWJC involves several challenges like material delamination due to the high velocity impact of the jet. To understand the delamination, three experimental tests were made: in the first test the cutting and the drilling was made with high water pressure (350 MPa), in the second test the cutting was made with high water pressure and for drilling was used low water pressure (200 MPa) and in last test a pre-drilled hole was used. Within those experiments was observed the CFRP delamination appears just during the drilling, not during the cutting. By decreasing the water jet pressure, the jet energy is decreased and in this way the delamination decrease.