Laser Cutting

A growing number of manufacturers in the medical industry are seeing the light when choosing a machining option for micro parts and features. The light they're seeing emanates from laser micromachining systems.

Laser Institute of America (LIA), the professional society for laser applications and safety, announces its release of the LIA Guide to High Power Laser Cutting. In the guide, students, engineers and scientists alike will gain a more in-depth understanding of the science behind laser cutting. Written by a team of specialists led by industry experts Dr. John Powell and Dr. Dirk Petring, this 136-page guide is a comprehensive resource that touches on all features of laser cutting machines and materials.

On March 2, mHUB, a physical-product innovation center and microfactory, celebrated its official grand opening in Chicago. The center is designed to galvanize the area's manufacturing ecosystem by generating innovative ideas, attracting world-class talent and fostering collaboration.

A 1 kW (average power) pulsed fiber laser from Coherent | Rofin offers a high beam quality for this power level, thus enabling high throughput, precision ablation for a variety of industrial and solar applications. Specifically, the FP 010 delivers a maximum pulse energy of 100 mJ, at pulse widths between 10 ns and 100 ns, and with repetition rates ranging from 10 kHz to 30 kHz.

A joint research project known as "Scaling Ultrafast Laser Productive Precision Processing Technology", or ScULPT, was conceived to develop an efficient, powerful, ultra-short pulsed laser system with a tenfold increase in throughput on the machining of different types of glass and metals.

A full line of ZnSe (zinc selenide) focusing lenses that are optimized for use with steel cutting lasers up to 4 kW and suitable field replacements by users is available from Laser Research Optics. Laser Research Optics CO2 Laser Lenses come in plano-convex and –meniscus configurations in 1" to 2" OD sizes with thicknesses ranging from 0.250" to 0.380".

A new 120W CO2 laser from Coherent offers a 30 percent better power/volume ratio than most competitive lasers in this class, enabling the construction of more compact laser-based systems for space-constrained, industrial applications. Additionally, the Cx-10 offers a unique combination of performance and reliability features to deliver both superior processing results and lower total cost of ownership.

MidOpt announces the availability of three new imaging filters primarily intended for blocking unwanted near-infrared light. Filters include: SP635 Absorptive Visible Shortpass/Near-IR Block Filter, SP644 Near-IR/Mid-Red Dichroic Block Shortpass Filter, and AB555 Acrylic Absorptive Near-IR/UV-Block Visible Bandpass Filter.

Amada Miyachi America Inc. announces the availability of the LMF70-HP, an addition to its LMF series of lasers. The 70 watt (W) LMF70-HP is ideal for welding small components and thin metals up to 0.01-inch (0.25 mm) thick. It is particularly well suited for welding battery tabs to cans (two thin sheets of metal), but can also weld thin wires (thermocouples, guidewires, etc.). In addition to welding, the unit is capable of engraving, deep engraving and cutting of metal, plastic welding and general-purpose, high-speed marking.

A line of sapphire cover glass windows and lenses for industrial cutting lasers that are more durable than fused silica to reduce the need for cover glass changes is available from Laser Research Optics. Laser Research Sapphire Fiber Laser Windows feature Moh 9 hardness, which is second only to diamond and have A/R coatings on both sides to provide transmission of greater than 99.5 percent at 1.06 microns, with greater than 90 percent at 650-670 nm.

OEM-quality replacement CO2 optics for engraving, marking and cutting lasers supplied from stock the same day or reverse engineered if necessary are being introduced by Laser Research Optics (LRO). Laser Research CO2 Optics meet OEM and ISO-10110 specs. and are available from stock or can be custom reverse engineered for virtually any engraving, marking, and cutting lasers.

The LUMEX Avance-25 laser sintering and milling machine integrates a fiber laser for state-of-the-art metal sintering and a machining center for performing high accuracy, high-speed milling, according to machine builder Matsuura Machinery Corp., Fukui City, Japan.