1.8kW diode laser system for fibre-delivery using brightness-enhanced diode stacks and a novel final beam-shaper

摘要

A 1.8kW diode laser source made up of 100 W diode bars is designed for fibre delivery, using two new techniques to enhance the delivered brightness and equalise the beam-parameter product. Custom corrective phase plates in laser-cut silica are attached permanently to the two stacks of ten bars, correcting bar smile and restoring a factor of 2.5 in lost brightness. The two units are beam-compacted and polarisation coupled to a single array beam. As a final step, a novel confocal beam-slicer produces five segments from the slow-axis beam profile and stacks the segments in the fast-axis direction.