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About Welding Process 34

The document discusses laser beam welding. It describes the key components of a laser welding unit including the laser generator, power supply, capacitor bank, and microscope. It explains that the important component is the ruby rod, which emits light energy that is shaped and directed onto the workpiece by an optical system. Laser welding uses high pulse repetition frequencies. Ruby lasers can make small spot welds in dissimilar metals, while CO2 gas lasers produce infrared beams. Laser welding melts a small cylindrical volume of material through the thickness of plates being joined.

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56 views1 page

About Welding Process 34

The document discusses laser beam welding. It describes the key components of a laser welding unit including the laser generator, power supply, capacitor bank, and microscope. It explains that the important component is the ruby rod, which emits light energy that is shaped and directed onto the workpiece by an optical system. Laser welding uses high pulse repetition frequencies. Ruby lasers can make small spot welds in dissimilar metals, while CO2 gas lasers produce infrared beams. Laser welding melts a small cylindrical volume of material through the thickness of plates being joined.

Uploaded by

Xerex
Copyright
© © All Rights Reserved
We take content rights seriously. If you suspect this is your content, claim it here.
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34 Welding Technology and Design

Figure 1.18 shows the essentials of the laser beam welding unit. The welding unit
consists of
(a) Laser generator
(b) Power supply
(c) Capacitor bank
(d) Microscope
The important component is the ruby rod which is enclosed in a pump cavity.
The cavity encloses a flash tube installed parallel with the ruby rod and fired by a
high voltage applied to its ends. On the inside the cavity is polished to serve as a
light reflector. The ruby rod is cooled by compressed air fed into the pump cavity.
The light energy emitted by the ruby rod is approximately shaped and directed
onto the work by optical system, consisting of a prism, a lens and an additional
lens system which can include several accessory lenses to converge the beam to a
spot of 0.25 to 0.05 mm diameter.
In laser welding the pulse should have maximum duration and minimum
spacings—high pulse repetition frequency. Present day lasers have the PRF (pulse
repetition frequency) ranging from 1 to 100 per minute.
Ruby laser (solid state laser) is used for making extremely small spot welds
(0.8 mm dia.) in dissimilar metals. Gas laser using CO2 is also employed which
produces continuous or pulsed infra-red beam of around 10 microns. The density
of energy obtained at the focussing point of a lens concentrating a laser beam, can
be as high as 5000 kw/sq. cm.
When the high power laser beam impinges on the surface of the metal, the
energy that is absorbed, heats up the surface and melting occurs. The laser beam
sharp and well focussed as it is, melts a small cylindrical volume of material through
the thickness of the plate. A column of vapour is surrounded by a liquid pool and
as the column is moved along the joint of the two plates, the material on the advacing
side of the hole throughout its depth is melted. As the column is narrow, the molten
metal at the rear end of the hold solidifies, thus resulting in the welded joint. The
vapour column is stablized by the balance between the energy density of the laser
beam and the welding speed. It is important to choose proper energy density and
the corresponding welding speed. Too high energy density will result in an unstable
hole which can cause drop through. Too low energy will not permit vapourisation
and the formation of liquid cylindrical volume. A welding speed too fast will
result in incomplete penetration and a slow speed will give rise to wide fusion
zones and possible drop-through. The depth to width ratio of the laser weld should
be greater than 4 to 1.
The hot fusion zone can absorb gases like hydrogen, oxygen and nitrogen.
Absorption of these gases is minimised by protecting the fusion zone by inert
gases as is done in gas metal arc welding.
Deep penetration welds produced with high power CO2 laser are similar to
electron beam welds. However, laser beam welding offers several advantages:
(a) A vacuum is not required for the work piece since the laser beams can
easily be transmitted through the air.
(b) X-rays are not generated in the laser beam/work piece interaction.

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