Summary
Sub-kilowatt CO2 lasers have been steadily gaining acceptance as tools for processing a wide variety of materials over the past few years and engineers are increasingly acknowledging their usefulness. This field of expertise can now be dramatically extended with a new, rugged 5 kW CO2 industrial laser that is recently commercially available in the UK. Such a laser offers the opportunity of designing machine tool systems, suitable for volume production work in deep penetration welding, surface alloying, transformation hardening of metals and cutting, and some aspects of this are discussed.
A brief description of a transverse gas flow laser is given and methods of manipulating and safely controlling the laser beam are discussed. Methods are outlined for using the laser beam to achieve the various processes and some practical processing results are given.
Preview
Unable to display preview. Download preview PDF.
References
Ward, B.A., Diamond machining metal mirrors using fly-cutting geomtry. Proc. Soc. Photo Optical Instrumentation Engineers, Vol 93 (1976), pp. 62–68.
Megaw, J.H.P.C. and Spalding, I.J., High Power Continous Lasers and their Applications. Physics in Technology, (Sept. 1976), pp. 187–194.
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Editor information
Editors and Affiliations
Copyright information
© 1979 Department of Mechanical Engineering, University of Manchester Institute of Science and Technology
About this chapter
Cite this chapter
Taylor, A.F. (1979). Materials Processing with a High Power Laser. In: Davies, B.J. (eds) Proceedings of the Nineteenth International Machine Tool Design and Research Conference. Palgrave, London. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-349-81412-1_69
Download citation
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-349-81412-1_69
Publisher Name: Palgrave, London
Print ISBN: 978-1-349-81414-5
Online ISBN: 978-1-349-81412-1
eBook Packages: Palgrave Social & Cultural Studies CollectionSocial Sciences (R0)