Abrasive waterjet technology has assumed a considerable importance in the cutting of naturalstone, offering numerous advantages in comparison with conventional methods.Natural stone removal by an abrasive water jet involves mainly erosion by the abrasive particlesimpacting on the cutting surface at high angles. The craters formed are due to brittle fractures.The present work describes a new test apparatus to study erosion due to the impact of a smallquantity of abrasive particles on a marble surface. The testing machine is made up of a tubethrough which a compressed-air flow at 10 bar pressure accelerates a small amount of abrasiveparticles towards a marble surface. In this way the action of the abrasive particles has beenseparated from that of water during marble cutting. By adjusting the values for both the pressureand the flow rate of the air it is possible to change the speed of the impinging particles. A pair ofposition transducers allow the indirect measurement of the abrasive grain speed.This work is addressed toward the analysis of the influence of both abrasive and impact angle onthe erosion of White Carrara marble using this new test equipment.
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