Installation and Training

You must have installation and training with your first waterjet system. You must have installation on your second, and training may still be a good idea. This author is aware of a handful of times that the buyer decided to perform all the installation procedures without aid of the manufacturer. More than half of the time the results were horrible. Even if you are familiar with machine tools, let those expert in that particular machine install the machine.

Installation should take no more than 2 weeks, one week for a simple standard system. A typical one-week installation should go as follows. The buyer is usually responsible for uncrating and locating the major components. Also, utility connections (power, water, air) are to be made. The manufacturer’s field service engineer (FSE) will normally perform all interconnections and inspect the utility hookups you have already established. On-site start-up service for a period of up to 4 consecutive days should start on a Monday or Tuesday. The buyer supplies a maintenance technician to help the FSE assemble, level, and align the XY, as well as make all HP plumbing connections. Sometimes special brackets must be made on-site if special unexpected plumbing considerations arise. The system is started up with help of the buyers’ electricians and plumbers. The system is flushed, and commissioned.

Flushing the system through an oversized scrap orifice helps remove debris from the high pressure plumbing lines. Even after extensive flushing, some debris can still come free in the plumbing and cause pre-mature failure of the orifice. An in-line filter should be placed as near to the cutting head as possible to minimize these failures. Check this filter often during the first few weeks (e.g., every 20 hours for 100 hours of pump run time) of operation.

Training should be 1 to 2 weeks at the manufacturer’s facility. Training should cover maintenance procedures, troubleshooting, programming, and operation. It is recommended that the operator, maintenance staff, and programmer attend training. Some training courses can be chopped up so that you don’t waste your programmer’s time at the maintenance training. Whatever training comes with the system, ensure your staff attends every bit of it. You paid for it (regardless whether the manufacturer said training is free or not). The better your initial training, the faster you’ll go up the learning curve, and the faster you’ll be productive and profitable.