Hi , I happened to see a short video about fiber laser welding and I was impressed with how nice and fast the welds were ,
Does anyone use this machine at work and can you tell us how it works ,
It would be used for automotive restoration and fabrication, mostly mild steel or aluminum , welding fender sections together etc.
and YES they are very expensive , but the price will probably drop
Some questions I have :
Can you weld 2 pieces of sheet metal that are not the same
thickness or alloy ?
How clean does the metal have to be ?
What does the backside of the weld look like ?
Is the weld as strong as a Tig , Mig or Arc weld ?
how malleable is the weld if you need to hammer it after welding ?
Can you fill a gap between 2 pieces ?
Can you spot weld with it ?
Probably more , put I think thats a good start .......Thanks for the info
NOHOME
MegaDork
4/21/20 4:43 p.m.
Without any filler rod the fit-up has to be perfect.
You can certainly tack weld and I imagine you could weld around the perimeter of a 3/8" hole to create a version of a puddle weld ( what e call a spot weld with Mig) But it would suck
https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S2090123216300078
Abstract
The study aimed at investigating the microstructure and mechanical properties of Neodymium-Doped Yttrium Aluminum Garnet (Nd:YAG) laser welded high strength low alloy (HSLA) SA516 grade 70 boiler steel. The weld joint for a 4 mm thick plate was successfully produced using minimum laser power of 2 kW by employing a single pass without any weld preheat treatment. The micrographs revealed the presence of martensite phase in the weld fusion zone which could be due to faster cooling rate of the laser weldment. A good correlation was found between the microstructural features of the weld joints and their mechanical properties. The highest hardness was found to be in the fusion zone of cap region due to formation of martensite and also enrichment of carbon. The hardness results also showed a narrow soft zone at the heat affected zone (HAZ) adjacent to the weld interface, which has no effect on the weld tensile strength. The yield strength and ultimate tensile strength of the welded joints were 338 MPa and 549 MPa, respectively, which were higher than the candidate metal. These tensile results suggested that the laser welding process had improved the weld strength even without any weld preheat treatment and also the fractography of the tensile fractured samples showed the ductile mode of failure.
In reply to californiamilleghia :
I have quite a bit of hands-on experience maintaining one of these machines at work.
We weld flat steel alloy blanks of dissimilar thicknesses together with a 4kW YAG laser. When it's dialed in correctly, it's extremely efficient and produces very strong results-I've personally seen welds that test at 110% the tensile strength of the parent material. We ball test blanks as part of our quality checks.
However, it is VERY dependent on alignment and cleanliness. Our blanks are washed on our blanking lines, and the weld cell is cleaned by a vacuum filtration system. They are held in place and aligned with servo material clamps during the weld process. The weld head is mounted to a gantry. Weld adjustments are done by the thousandth of an inch.
Our machine is roughly 8 years old though, and the technology has progressed quite a bit since then.
Thanks for the info , is there anyway to use filler rod when you need to fill a hole or a gap ?
From what you have posted it does not look like it will work well welding patch panels etc
But it sure looks nice :)
NOHOME
MegaDork
3/27/22 7:20 a.m.
I understand they are great for welding the thin metal on aluminum canoes
