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If we are to name one thing that has been constant in the manufacturing industry over the years, it would be customers’ need for more sophisticated machining technologies to meet their stringent design and manufacturing requirements. One machining technology that has been helping machinists satisfy these requirements today is the CNC laser cutter.

A CNC laser cutter is a piece of computer numerical control (CNC) equipment that uses a focused, high-powered laser beam to mark, cut, or engrave a material to form custom shapes. Its unique design and operation make it highly accurate, especially when cutting intricate shapes and small holes.

Control fracture cutting

For brittle materials that are easily damaged by heat, high-speed and controllable cutting is performed by laser beam heating, which is called controlled fracture cutting. laser cutting samples The main content of this cutting process is: the laser beam heats a small area of ​​the brittle material, causing a large thermal gradient and severe mechanical deformation in this area, leading to the formation of cracks in the material. As long as a uniform heating gradient is maintained, the laser beam can guide cracks in any desired direction.

Vaporized cutting

Under the heating of the high-power density laser beam, the surface temperature of the material rises to the boiling point temperature very fast, enough to avoid melting caused by heat conduction, so part of the material vaporizes into steam and disappears, and part of the material is sprayed from the bottom of the slit by auxiliary gas The flow blows away. 

Oxidation melting cutting

Melting and cutting generally use inert gas. If it is replaced by oxygen or other active gases, the material is ignited under the irradiation of a laser beam, and a fierce chemical reaction with oxygen generates another heat source, which is called oxidative melting and cutting.

Melt cutting

When the power density of the incident laser beam exceeds a certain value, the inside of the material at the point where the beam is irradiated begins to evaporate, forming holes. Once this small hole is formed, it will act as a black body to absorb all the incident beam energy. The small hole is surrounded by the molten metal wall, and then the auxiliary airflow coaxial with the beam takes away the molten material around the hole. As the workpiece moves, the small hole moves synchronously in the cutting direction to form a slit. The laser beam continues to irradiate along the leading edge of this slit, and the molten material is continuously or pulsatingly blown away from the slit. 

Advantages of CNC Laser Cutting

Here is a list of some of the advantages of the CNC laser cutting process over conventional CNC machining processes:

1.CNC laser cutting produces more intricate designs and holes as small as 2 mm with a high degree of accuracy and precision.

2.CNC laser cutting produces cleaner cuts, eliminating the need for additional post-processing (or finishing ) operations.

3.CNC laser cutters eliminate the need for several cutting tools or custom tools, such as in conventional CNC routers and milling machines.

4.The non-contact nature of the laser cutting process decreases the risk of material distortion and material contamination, making them ideal for machining components that will be used in the medical industry.