Every wire saw manufacturer writes “intelligent automation” on the brochure. Below is what our software actually does, function by function, with the numbers. Both the Gem Slicer Standard and the Gem Slicer Mini run it — the same build, the same screens. The Standard has an 8-inch panel, the Mini a 7-inch one.
Automatic Cutting
This is the function that decides whether a saw earns its floor space. You build a queue of slices and the machine works through it on its own.
You are not limited to “cut it into equal pieces”. For each group of slices in the queue you set:
- how thick the slices are, and how many of them;
- the cutting feed for that group — thin sections through the interesting part of a specimen, faster passes through the rest;
- how the Z axis returns between slices — its speed, and whether it steps and pauses on the way rather than travelling in one move;
- how long the machine waits before starting the next slice.
Any of the pauses can be set to zero and switched off entirely. Recipes that work can be saved and loaded again for the next specimen of the same material.
While it runs, the screen shows the distance travelled, the percentage complete and the time remaining. Start the queue before you leave, look in during the evening from your phone, come back to a finished stack.
Kerf Compensation
You tell the software the diameter of the wire you have fitted. From then on every X move is the slice thickness plus the wire diameter, so the slice you asked for is the slice you measure afterwards.
It sounds trivial until you cut fifty sections and find every one of them 0.22 mm thinner than the number you typed. Set the wire diameter correctly and the arithmetic stops being your problem.
Anti-Tummy
A long cut wants to belly. The wire deflects slightly under feed, the cut lags behind in the middle, and the slice comes out convex — the “tummy”.
Anti-tummy pauses the Z feed at intervals while the reel keeps running. The wire goes on cutting where it already is, catches up with the material it left behind, and the slice comes out flat. The default is fifteen minutes of pause per hour, and you can set it to whatever your material needs.
Z-Retract
The companion to anti-tummy. Z-retract lowers the Z axis on a pattern you set, straightening the bow the wire has taken. It earns its place on very hard or very large material, where even an experienced operator cannot judge in advance what feed rate the stone will accept.
Used together, the two functions keep the wire straight and the cut face square, without you standing over the machine adjusting the feed by hand.
The Positioning Laser
A laser projects the plane of the cut onto the specimen before anything turns. You align the stone to a visible line instead of to an estimate, and you can see where the wire will exit on the far side.
For analytical work this is repeatability rather than convenience: the same setup gives the same section, and a sample that has to be re-cut can be returned to the same plane.
Camera and Remote Access
There is a camera inside the cutting chamber. The machine joins your Wi-Fi or LAN, and through AnyDesk you get the actual control panel on your phone or laptop — not a status page. Watch the cut, change the feed rate, advance to the next slice, send the Z axis back to its start point, or stop the machine, from anywhere.
An extra USB camera can be plugged in and selected from the device list if you want a second angle.
The Machine Tells You What Is Wrong
Messages appear on screen in plain language, with the cause and the fix:
| Tighten the wire to activate | the wire is slack or broken |
| Mechanical endswitch activated | the wire is torn, or the reel slider has run out of range |
| Motor alarm | the reel motor drew too much current; reset it from the R/Wire screen |
| Coolant critically low | not enough water — top up the reservoir |
On the Standard, the water level is watched by two sensors: the first warns while cutting continues, the second stops the cut before the pump can run dry. On the Mini you check the level yourself.
The Numbers
| Cutting feed (Z) | 1.00 to 200.00 mm/h |
| Wire linear speed | 40 to 120 m/min (Standard); 40 to 100 m/min (Mini) |
| X positioning resolution | 0.02 mm, ball screw |
| X jog steps | 0.01, 0.10, 1.00 mm, or continuous |
| X jog speeds | 2, 4, 10, 20 mm/s |
| Z jog speeds | 2 and 4 mm/s |
| Anti-tummy pause | adjustable, default 15 min/h |
| Z origin | found automatically by a proximity sensor |
| Hour meter | counts Z-axis running time, shown on screen |
Cutting cannot start unless the reel is running. That is deliberate: it is the one sequence error that costs you a wire.
Updates
Software updates arrive as a single file. Copy it to a USB stick, plug it into the machine, press Update Software, restart. No engineer, no service visit, no licence fee. Support and cutting advice are included for the life of the machine.
In Development
Two things we are working on at the time of writing, August 2026. Neither is a shipping feature and we are not putting a date on either — they are here so you can see where the software is going, not so you can plan around them.
- Fully digital control of the water flow.
- Display messages sent to the operator by email, for installations where the saw runs unattended for long periods. Note that an email tells you something has happened; on the Standard it is the second water sensor that actually stops the cut.
If either of these matters to your decision, ask us where it stands before you order rather than after.