International Journal of Extreme Manufacturing, Volume. 2, Issue 3, 35101(2020)

Implications of using two low-power continuous-wave lasers for polishing

Wenxuan Zhang1...2,*, Kiwan Wong3, Miguel Morales4, Carlos Molpeceres4, and Craig B Arnold25 |Show fewer author(s)
Author Affiliations
  • 1Department of Chemical and Biological Engineering, Princeton University, Princeton, NJ 08544, United States of America
  • 2Princeton Institute for the Science and Technology of Materials, Princeton University, Princeton, NJ 08544, United States of America
  • 3Department of Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering, The Hong Kong University of Science and Technology, Hong Kong, China
  • 4Centro L′aser UPM, Universidad Polit′ecnica de Madrid, Alan Turing 1, 28031, Madrid, Spain
  • 5Department of Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering, Princeton University, Princeton, NJ 08544, United States of America
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    Laser polishing is widely employed to reduce the surface roughness of products with complex geometries. Traditional laser polishing techniques use a single high-power Gaussian beam to melt and smooth a thin layer of surface material. However, the reliance on high power lasers can present practical challenges such as minimizing surface evaporation or reducing overall cost. In this work, we combined two identical low-power laser beams with a spatial offset in between them to construct an elliptical beam. By changing the spatial offset, combined beams with different lengths along the major axis can be created. We observe over 20% improvement in line roughness reduction using this approach compared to a single Gaussian laser beam with the same total power. Additionally, both experiment and simulation results suggest such improvement is because this dual-laser set-up can create a longer molten pool compared to a single laser.

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    Wenxuan Zhang, Kiwan Wong, Miguel Morales, Carlos Molpeceres, Craig B Arnold. Implications of using two low-power continuous-wave lasers for polishing[J]. International Journal of Extreme Manufacturing, 2020, 2(3): 35101

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    Paper Information

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    Received: Feb. 3, 2020

    Accepted: --

    Published Online: Jan. 28, 2021

    The Author Email: Zhang Wenxuan (cbarnold@princeton.edu)

    DOI:10.1088/2631-7990/ab94c6

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