Five applications of high power semiconductor lasers in industrial fields

With the development of semiconductor chip technology and optical technology, the output power of semiconductor lasers has been continuously improved, the beam quality has been significantly improved, and more applications have been obtained in the industrial field.

At present, the output power and beam quality of industrial high-power semiconductor lasers have exceeded that of lamp pumped YAG lasers and are close to that of semiconductor pumped YAG lasers.

Semiconductor lasers have been gradually applied to plastic welding, cladding and alloying, surface heat treatment, metal welding and so on.

(1) laser plastic welding

The beam of a semiconductor laser is a flat-crest beam with a uniform spatial distribution of cross-sectional light intensity.

Compared with the beam of YAG laser, the beam of semiconductor laser can obtain better weld consistency and welding quality in plastic welding applications, and can perform wide seam welding.

The power requirement of semiconductor laser is not high in the application of plastic welding, which is generally 50 ~ 700W, the beam mass is less than 100mm/mrad, and the spot size is 0.5 ~ 5mm.

Welding with this technique does not damage the surface of the workpiece, local heating reduces the thermal stress on the plastic parts, avoids the destruction of embedded electronic components, and better avoids plastic melting.

By optimizing the materials and pigments, different synthetic colors can be obtained by laser plastic welding.

At present, semiconductor laser has been widely used in welding sealed container, electronic component shell, automotive parts and foreign plastic components.

(2) laser cladding and surface heat treatment

It is an important application of semiconductor laser in machining to conduct surface heat treatment or local cladding on metal parts with high wear resistance and corrosion resistance.

The power of the semiconductor laser used for laser cladding and surface heat treatment is 1 ~ 6kW, the beam mass is 100 ~ 400mm/mrad, and the spot size is 2×2mm2 ~ 3×3mm2 or 1×5mm2.

Compared with other lasers, the advantages of cladding and surface heat treatment with semiconductor laser beams lie in their high electro-optic efficiency, high absorption rate, low maintenance cost, rectangular spot shape and uniform distribution of light intensity.

At present, semiconductor laser cladding and surface heat treatment have been widely used in power, petrochemical, metallurgy, steel, machinery and other industrial fields, and become one of the important means of new material preparation, rapid and direct manufacturing of metal parts, green remanufacturing of failed metal parts.

（3）laser metal welding

High-power semiconductor lasers are widely used in metal welding, ranging from precision spot welding in automobile industry to heat conduction welding of production materials and axial welding of pipelines.

The semiconductor laser used for thin sheet metal welding requires a power of 300 ~ 3000W, a beam mass of 40 ~ 150mm/mrad, a spot size of 0.4 ~ 1.5mm, and a thickness of 0.1 ~ 2.5mm for the welding material.

Due to low heat input, distortion of parts is kept to a minimum.

High power semiconductor laser can be used for high speed welding, the welding seam is smooth and beautiful, it has special advantages in the welding process and labor saving before and after welding, it is very suitable for different needs of industrial welding, it will gradually replace the traditional welding method.

(4) laser marking

Laser marking technology is one of the biggest applications in laser processing.

Currently, YAG laser, CO2 laser and semiconductor pumped laser are used.

But with the improvement of laser beam quality, semiconductor laser marking machine has been applied in marking field.

LIMO has launched a 50W direct output semiconductor laser with beam quality up to 5mm/mrad, and a 25W direct output semiconductor laser with 50 m fiber coupling, which has met the requirements of laser output power and beam quality for marking applications.

(5) laser cutting

The application of high power semiconductor laser in cutting field started late.

With the support of the modular semiconductor laser system (MDS) project of the German ministry of education and research, the fraunhofer institute developed a semi-conductor laser cutting machine with a power of 800W in 2001, which can cut 10mm thick steel plates at a cutting speed of 0.4m/min.

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TORCH specializes in the research and development of high-power laser vacuum welding furnace, which has been successfully used in many high-power lasers in China, and can replace the vacuum furnace imported from Germany seamlessly.

If you have any questions about high power laser vacuum welding, please contact our technical expert.

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