Application range of laser cutting technology

Laser cutting technology is widely used in construction machinery, agricultural machinery, military weapons, petroleum, ports, printing and packaging, automobiles, elevators, aerospace and other manufacturing and processing industries.

The principle of laser cutting

principle

Laser cutting is to irradiate the workpiece with a focused high-power density laser beam to quickly melt, vaporize, ablate or reach the ignition point of the irradiated material. At the same time, the molten material is blown away by the high-speed airflow coaxial with the beam to realize the cutting of the workpiece. open. Laser cutting is one of the thermal cutting methods.

classification

Laser cutting can be divided into four categories: laser vaporization cutting, laser melting cutting, laser oxygen cutting and laser scribing and controlled fracture.

1) Laser vaporization cutting

The high-energy-density laser beam is used to heat the workpiece, so that the temperature rises rapidly, reaching the boiling point of the material in a very short time, and the material starts to vaporize and form vapor. The jetting speed of these vapors is very high, and at the same time the vapor jets, cuts are formed in the material. The heat of vaporization of materials is generally very large, so a large power and power density are required for laser vaporization and cutting.

Laser vaporization cutting is mostly used for cutting extremely thin metal materials and non-metal materials (such as paper, cloth, wood, plastic, rubber, etc.).

2) Laser melting and cutting

In laser melting and cutting, the metal material is melted by laser heating, and then non-oxidizing gas (Ar, He, N, etc.) is sprayed through a nozzle coaxial with the beam, and the liquid metal is discharged by the strong pressure of the gas to form an incision. Laser melting and cutting do not need to vaporize the metal completely, and the energy required is only 1/10 of that of vaporized cutting.

Laser melting cutting is mainly used for cutting some non-oxidizable materials or active metals, such as stainless steel, titanium, aluminum and their alloys.

3) Laser oxygen cutting

The principle of laser oxygen cutting is similar to oxyacetylene cutting. It uses laser as the preheating heat source and oxygen and other active gas as cutting gas. On the one hand, the blown gas reacts with the cutting metal to cause oxidation reaction and release a large amount of oxidation heat; on the other hand, the molten oxide and melt are blown out of the reaction zone to form an incision in the metal. Since the oxidation reaction in the cutting process generates a lot of heat, the energy required for laser oxygen cutting is only 1/2 of the melting cutting, and the cutting speed is much faster than laser vaporization cutting and melting cutting. Laser oxygen cutting is mainly used for easily oxidized metal materials such as carbon steel, titanium steel and heat-treated steel.

4) Laser scribing and controlled fracture

Laser scribing uses a high-energy density laser to scan the surface of the brittle material, so that the material is heated to evaporate a small groove, and then a certain pressure is applied, and the brittle material will crack along the small groove. The lasers used for laser scribing are generally Q-switched lasers and CO2 lasers.

Controlled fracture is the use of the steep temperature distribution generated when the laser groove is carved, which generates local thermal stress in the brittle material and causes the material to break along the small groove.

The above is the introduction of the principle of the metal laser cutting machine. The metal laser cutting machine is a kind of automatic typesetting machine equipment, which can save a lot of materials, and the material cut by the metal laser cutting machine is very flat, and its incision is very smooth. The price of the metal laser cutting machine is not cheap. Generally, the price is more than 10,000 to 20,000, but this type of equipment can reduce the processing cost during operation. Most processing manufacturers will choose this equipment, which can reduce the manufacturing cost and processing cost of the enterprise.

Advantages of laser cutting technology

Fast cutting speed, good cutting quality and high precision. Save investment, save cost, simple operation, safety, stable performance, improve the speed of new product development, and have great flexibility and wide adaptability.