纳斯卡车队安装水射流切割系统

当纳斯卡赛车让人联想到机油、油脂、汗水和污垢时，生产和维护这些高性能赛车的专业制造车间干净得一尘不染，并配备了先进的复合材料和金属制造设备。一个很好的例子是:丰田公司支持的Michael Waltrip Racing (MWR，Cornelius, N.C.) recently completed a 140,000-ft2 (13,000m2) fabrication shop and increased its manufacturing capabilities, including, says Dr. Eric Warren, MWR VP and technical director, the purchase of a Jet Edge (St. Michael, Minn) 3-axis waterjet cutting system to cut and trim parts for the approximately 56 Toyota race cars that MWR manufactures each year for its four racing teams. The system, a 4-ft by 8-ft (1.2m by 2.4m) high rail gantry with a 50-hp, 60,000-psi iP60-50 intensifier pump, has two abrasive cutting heads on a spreader bar. With its digital readout for multihead positioning capability, the system eliminates manual measurements. It also is equipped with a pneumatic drill for pre-piercing composite materials that might otherwise delaminate in the waterjet. SigmaNEST CAD/CAM nesting software developed by SigmaTEK Systems LLC (Cincinnati, Ohio) is included, as are closed-loop filtration and abrasive removal systems supplied by Ebbco (New Baltimore, Mich.) and a bulk abrasive storage system from GMA Garnet (USA) Corp. (Houston, Texas).

沃伦说，用水射流切割的部件包括复合材料管道、泡沫材料、挤压板、支撑板，特别是对时间敏感的聚碳酸酯前分隔板(见图)。NASCAR要求的下压力，后者需要在每次比赛中更换多次，可以在不到13分钟的时间内进行水射流修整。他解释说:“在Jet Edge系统之前，我们把切割工作外包出去，这花费了我们大量的时间和金钱。“其精确度、可重复性和准确性……这正是我们在这个行业所需要的。”