Many lasers are currently used in the processing of metals for diverse industries such as automotive, shipbuilding, medical, etc. These lasers tend to be very high power and are used to cut through what can be considered thick metals of different composition. These lasers are used for cutting, drilling, welding and surface alteration. However, there are many emerging applications that reqire very thin metals to be processed with very high accuracy and also with very clean edges. Recent years have witnessed the introduction of several new laser technologies for laser micromachining. These lasers possess excellent mode quality and high focusability - important for achieving small feature sizes.In this study, we compare the results obtained using the primarily the frequency-tripled diode-pumped Nd:vanadate (355 nm wavelength) laser. In some cases we have also used several other lasers to process the same metals and we compare the processing results from a speed and quality perspective. We focus attention on cutting complex patterns in various metals of different thickness.
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