What are the best maintenance practices to maximize the service life of a tungsten carbide nozzle? Even tungsten carbide will eventually wear, but you can significantly extend its life with proper care. First, always use clean, filtered abrasive and fluid. Contaminants like rust flakes, weld slag, or large particle clusters will gouge the bore wall unevenly. Second, check the nozzle inlet and outlet regularly for chipping. A chipped outlet disrupts the flow stream, causing asymmetric wear and reduced cutting or cleaning efficiency. Replace the nozzle as soon as you see measurable bore diameter increase—typically when the exit diameter has grown by 15-20% from new. Third, ensure proper alignment. In a waterjet system, if the focusing tube is not perfectly concentric with the water orifice, the abrasive stream will erode one side of the tube much faster than the other. Fourth, when installing or removing a nozzle, use a soft-faced hammer or a dedicated wrench on the flats—never strike the carbide body directly, and avoid cross-threading the retaining nut. Finally, store spare nozzles in a dry, padded container; dropping a tungsten carbide nozzle onto a concrete floor, even from a low height, can create invisible micro-cracks that will cause sudden failure under pressure. Follow these steps, and you can easily double the useful life of every nozzle. https://www.xymjcarbide.com/products/tungsten-carbide-nozzle