Internal cavities and oil lines, Material: Stainless Steel PH1.
Image courtesy of EOS North America
deposition (LMD); direct metal laser sintering (DMLS) in a powder bed; and selective laser sintering (SLS) of a wide range of materials, from plastic, metal, ceramic or glass. The LMD process uses either solid-state or CO2
lasers up to several
kilowatts, to deliver sprayed metal powder to a base component via laser melting. Most recently, the availability of high-power fi ber
as fi ber or disk lasers). Most often laser welding is done autogenously and part fi t-up and fi xturing are key elements. For diffi cult material combinations, poor part fi tup, and welds with deeper penetration than autogenous methods permit, hybrid welding is used. Methods include the addition of either cold or hot wire with laser. Some of the benefi ts of the fi ber and disk lasers (in addition to being fi ber delivered which makes integration to robots or equipment easy) are very good beam quality which allows the use of long focal lengths and the ability to do remote welding. Remote welding uses special optics or a high-power galvanometer to steer the beam and produce very fast welds. High-power laser welding is used by aerospace, automotive, mining, construc- tion, and agriculture in a variety of applications. The benefi ts of speed and repeatability make lasers an excellent choice for high production parts that demand quality welds.
Additive Manufacturing While there are many processes used to cre- ate objects layer by layer from a digital design fi le, laser-based ones are recognized as having the most potential in industry for several reasons. Foremost, the laser beam can be tightly controlled to deliver precise results with superior detail resolution. That helps additive manufacturing deliver on its promise of building fi nished objects with little waste, regard- less of complexity. Lasers are the vital component of a variety of AM technologies, including laser metal
LF14
AdvancedManufacturing.org
delivered solid-state lasers has expanded the use of robotics in this fi eld. While this technology has been used for high deposition cladding and hard facing applications in the past, when combined with preci- sion power nozzles and small laser spot sizes, higher defi nition additive manufacturing can be performed. The powder bed processes are capable of pro- cessing most weldable engineering metals as well as a number of high-performance polymers. The move of this technology from rapid prototyping to true manufacturing applications is accelerating in all ma- jor industrial fi elds, including aerospace, automotive, consumer goods, medical components and tooling. For DMLS, the developments in robust Yb:YAG (Ytterbium-doped YAG) fi ber lasers has greatly advanced the capabilities of this manufacturing plat- form. Single-mode fi ber lasers ranging from 200 W to 1 kW combined with high-speed digital scanners are critical for the success of this technology. With layer thicknesses commonly as small as 20 μm, small laser spot sizes, precise laser power control and accurate high-speed scanner trajectories are critical. SLS is powered by sealed CO2
lasers for optimum
laser absorption in the polymer materials. These maintenance-free lasers in the 50–100-W range are the perfect power source for precision melting of polymer powders used in the SLS process.
This feature article was edited from information provided by members of SME’s Industrial Laser Community.
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