Comparison between Abrasive Water Jet Cutting and Laser Cutting

This paper is intended to demonstrate the advantages and disadvantages of laser profiling techniques as compared with the Abrasive Water Jet (AWJ). The growth of AWJ as a cutting tool has provided engineers with a new profiling technique which often offers great technical and commercial advantages over more traditional methods. However, AWJ cutting is not the best solution to all profiling problems. There are a number of techniques which compete with or complement the process and the optimum profiling method can be difficult to identify[1]. The following paper serves as a general guide-line comparing two competitive cutting methods (CO2 laser cutting and Nd: YAG laser cutting) with AWJ cutting. The subject of cutting covers a great many more processes than can be reviewed in one article but the techniques to be discussed were chosen because they all involve profiling using an axially symmetric energy beam of some sort.