INVESTIGATION OF LASER-INDUCED MATERIAL REMOVAL OF STAINLESS STEEL AT THE SUPER-MICRON LEVEL

摘要

There has been a good deal of research conductedregarding laser machining at the micron level andbelow, however the feasibility of scaling laser-inducedmaterial removal processes to the super-micron levelwith regard to cost and quality has not been thoroughlyinvestigated. The experimental results of laser-inducedmaterial removal of stainless steel by pulsed CO2 andQ-switched Nd:YAG lasers are presented.Experiments include the machining of channels of 0.8mm width by 0.8 mm depth using a 2 kW CO2 laser.The effects of assist gas type, assist gas directionrelative to beam motion, beam mode, and multipleparameter processing are discussed. Material removalby drilling with a 10 W (average power) Q-switchedNd:YAG laser is also explored through experimentsdesigned to test the scalability of processingparameters for a range of hole sizes. The resultsshould be useful for analyzing material removal forfeatures at the super-micron level.