fiber laser heads

Comparing laser engraving machines: CO2 lasers Vs Fiber lasers

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Laser engraving is a process that facilitates the vaporization of materials into fumes in order to engrave deep and permanent marks. The laser beam here acts like a chisel, engraving marks through the removal of layers from the surface of the material. For laser engraving, the laser hits certain localized areas for massive energy levels for engraving metal pieces that will be ultimately exposed to a number of surface or wear treatments. Metal engraving with aluminium and steel inclusive of both die-casting and anodized aluminium. The best feature of the process is the ability to engrave two-dimensional codes for high rates of readability even after the treatments that are done post-process.

 Fiber lasers

Fiber lasers with fiber laser heads utilize fiber optics as a gain medium. Other common gain mediums are mixtures of dyes, crystals, and gazes.

Fiber lasers utilize laser diodes as a source of energy. The wavelength of the light pumped is often altered due to rare earth elements doped in the gain medium.

 Advantages of fiber lasers

Highly adaptable to a number of metals like aluminium

Low or no maintenance required

Longer life cycles

High efficiency

Lesser requirement for heat management

CO2 lasers

C02 lasers with CO2 laser heads are an important part of the category of gas lasers. The source of energy for gas lasers is most commonly electric discharge, similar to the ones utilised for fluorescent lamps. Its main gain medium is a mixture of gases, composed of CO2.

Advantages of CO2 lasers

Highly adapted to breaking organic bonds of carbon-oxygen, which are mainly found in cardboard, paper, wood, ceramics, and plastics.

A highly established technology for welding and cutting metal plates.

Commonly employed in a number of industries such as the food, pharmaceutical and packaging industry.

The future trends in fiber lasers and CO2 lasers

Thanks to the scalability that fiber lasers offer, their efficiency and stability in terms of heat management, fiber laser technology can be increasingly used for a number of applications. Given the technological advancements in fiber lasers and the reduction in the prices of high-power lasers, there has been a notable increment in the CO2 systems that are retrofitted with fiber lasers for a variety of industrial applications, including laser welding and laser cutting in a number of manufacturing facilities. This trend is likely to be consistent for the years to come as well.

Conclusion

In addition to engraving and etching, Dynotech Instruments’ laser technologies can be employed for the purpose of marking identifiers and logos such as serial numbers and barcodes.

laser beam light

Laser cleaning: A holy grail for industrial cleaning applications

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Laser cleaning is an environment-friendly process altogether. It can be utilized to effectively remove contaminants from the surface of metals. Given its accuracy and efficacy, it is being increasingly used for a wide range of applications, serving a number of industries. Laser cleaning is done using a pulsed-fiber laser over the traditional methods of cleaning that are highly tedious. Rust removal for example is highly time and manpower consuming.

Laser cleaning- A cost-effective solution

Manual removal of oxides on the other hand can be hazardous, given the involvement of direct contact with the chemical substances. Dealing with such problems in manufacturing and production can come with high costs, however, laser cleaning is changing this notion by being a highly cost-effective solution in itself for reducing the requirement of maintenance and high cleaning times. Laser ablation is a phenomenon that occurs when a coating or the layer of a material is removed employing a laser beam. This is the major process occurring behind all the applications of laser cleaning.

The ablation threshold

Laser rust removal from the surface of steel is an example of laser cleaning. There is an ablation threshold for all materials. Laser cleaning helps differentiate between materials while trying to remove an undesirable layer from a particular object. The selection of material to be removed becomes easier, given a considerably high difference of ablation threshold between materials. Additionally, fiber-laser cleaning systems can remove the undesired layers on the top of materials utilising two distinct methods.

A safe solution

The laser beam light can either be pulsed or a continuous light wave. The results using both types of fiber laser cleaning waves remain almost the same, however the speed of laser removal varies. Lasers utilise no solvents or chemicals which makes laser cleaning of surfaces a safe solution for industrial cleaning purposes. For example, utilisation of laser cleaning in nuclear power plants facilitates effective cleaning of pipes for large-scale projects. Laser cleaning is a no contact technique for cleaning serving the widest range of industrial purposes with the highest accuracy and efficacy.

In the present-day time, the most common applications of laser cleaning include;

1.Welding pre-treatment for the removal of rust and contaminants for a range of materials.

2.Welding post-treatment helps with the removal of oxides from materials such as stainless steel and aluminium.

3.Surface preparation using laser also helps maximise the level of paint adhesion.

Conclusion

Dynotech’s laser cleaning solutions help overcome a number of problems faced for cleaning applications in the industrial sector including automotive, med-tech, biomedical, consumer, solar industry and much more.