Metal service center JACQUET Southeast is now offering large-format water jet cutting services to the southeastern U.S. at its new metal processing and distribution center in Charlotte, N.C.

JACQUET Southeast is capable of processing materials up to 21'x13' on its Jet Edge Mid Rail Gantry water jet cutting machine. The company also offers plasma cutting services and carries 19 different grades of stainless steel and nickel alloy plates in a wide variety of sizes and thicknesses.

A subsidiary of JACQUET Mid-Atlantic of Pottstown, Pa., and JACQUET Metals of Lyon Saint Priest, France, JACQUET Southeast serves the Carolinas, Tennessee, Georgia, Florida and Alabama. It is one of five JACQUET metal service centers in the U.S. JACQUET also has service centers in Pottstown, Houston, Racine, Wis., and Irvine, Calif.

JACQUET Southeast specializes in supplying and processing stainless steel and nickel alloys for a wide variety of industries, including power generation, chemical processing, wastewater treatment, aviation and aerospace, textiles and nuclear applications. With its water jet and plasma cutting capabilities, the company can offer standard shape cutting of rings or discs as well as intricate parts from customer drawings.

While JACQUET's Charlotte metal processing and distribution center is new, JACQUET is not new to the Southeast, explained Ryan Hendrix, manager/owner of JACQUET Southeast. The company has been serving the region through its Mid-Atlantic facility for several years, and opened a sales office in Charlotte in 2007.

"There are not a lot of companies stocking and processing stainless plate in the Southeast, so we are uniquely geographically located," said Hendrix, who noted that JACQUET decided to open a metal processing facility in Charlotte to meet the region's growing demand and to provide same or next-day rush services to its southeastern customers.

"We offer a level of customer service that sets us apart," Hendrix continued. "When you couple that with our ability to respond quickly to our customers here in the Southeast from our new facility in Charlotte, I believe we have a great deal to offer our customers. We are extremely excited to now have the ability to be able to offer next-day or even same-day cutting and shipping to our customers."

Hendrix explained that he decided to install a Jet Edge waterjet system in Charlotte based on JACQUET's satisfaction with its Jet Edge equipment at its other U.S. service centers. JACQUET Southeast's Jet Edge is the company's seventh Jet Edge nationwide.

"You can just do so much with a Jet Edge waterjet that we felt like we had to have that capability," Hendrix said. "Many of our customers find that they can save a good deal of money by having us waterjet pieces as opposed to other cutting methods, as it greatly reduces the amount of machining they have to do to the part once they receive it. We can offer such a nice finish on the edges by just waterjet cutting, and customers really respond to that."

To meet its customers' needs for large-format cutting, JACQUET equipped its Jet Edge waterjet table with two Jet Edge Permalign II abrasivejet cutting heads and a 100HP intensifier pump to increase productivity. They also added an optional mirroring package which makes it possible to cut large parts twice as fast, independent programmable Z carriages, programmable height sensing, a fully-functional remote pendant, large-capacity bulk abrasive hopper, submerged cutting package, a closed-loop water filtration system, and a garnet removal system. JACQUET's Jet Edge

Mid Rail Gantry is capable of maintaining +/- 0.001" linear positional accuracy (over 12") and +/- 0.001" repeatability (bi-directional).