in diameter than the other edm wires track 112 is also thinner in the axial direction than the other tracks guide wheel 96 is the same size and shape as the other guides but it serves to guide wire 94 even though wire 94 is smaller in diameter than the other wires the generally u201c v u201d shaped configuration of the annular groove in guide wheel 96 within which wire 94 rides accommodates various diameter wires cutting wheel can be specially constructed to have a smaller diameter and thinner ring than the other cutting wheels or it may simply have resulted from repeated remanufacturing of the track 112 the axial thickness of track 112 is dictated by the diameter of the wire that is used in fabricating it from a blank track as is illustrated particularly in fig8 the cutting wheels can be used in series if desired the length of the cutting zone is significantly extended where the cutting wheels are used in series in the configuration illustrated in fig8 fig7 could have cutting wheels arrayed in both parallel and series as will be understood by those skilled in the art other configurations can be used for example the configuration shown in fig1 or 5.