The principle and development prospects of metal cutting machines

Lasers are very magical, and they have now been applied in various industries, such as metal cutting, textile fabric cutting, laser marking, laser engraving, etc. However, many people are not very clear about the principles of lasers. Today, we will explain in detail how metal cutting machines work using lasers.:

Principle of Laser Beam: The laser beam is focused into a very small spot with a minimum diameter (less than 0.1mm), achieving a high power density (greater than 106W/cm2). With the relative linear movement of the beam and the material, a narrow width (for example, about 0.1 mm) slit is continuously formed in the hole. The heat-affected zone is small, and there is almost no deformation of the workpiece.

Cutting Process: When cutting metal with lasers, auxiliary gases suitable for the material to be cut are added. When cutting steel, oxygen should be used as the auxiliary gas, which reacts exothermically with the molten metal, oxidizing the material and helping to blow away the slag in the gap. In the metal processing industry, which occupies a significant weight in industrial manufacturing, many metal materials, regardless of hardness, can be cut without deformation (currently, the most advanced metal laser cutting machines can cut industrial steel with a thickness of nearly 20mm). Of course, for materials with high reflectivity, such as gold, silver, copper, and aluminum alloys, they are also good heat conductors, making laser cutting difficult or even impossible (some difficult-to-cut materials can be cut with pulsed laser beams, as the absorption coefficient of the material for the beam sharply increases due to the extremely high peak power of the pulse wave).

Development Prospects of Metal Cutting Machines:

As a new type of processing method, metal cutting machines have been widely used in the leather, textile, and clothing industries due to their advantages of high precision, fast speed, simple operation, and high degree of automation. Today, they are also widely used in metal processing. Compared with traditional cutting methods, metal cutting machines are not only low in price and energy consumption, but also because laser processing does not exert mechanical pressure on the workpiece, the cutting product has good results, high precision, and fast cutting speed, with characteristics of safe operation and simple maintenance. Laser equipment has been researched internationally for decades, but in China, it is still in a new stage, especially for metal cutting machines, which come in various types but are still in the initial development stage.

Although the development of the laser industry in China is still in its early stages, it has made leaps under the guidance of international technology, showing outstanding performance at a higher stage than equivalent quality.Since the first laser device was born and applied in the 1960s, many experts in China have made efforts in the laser industry, achieving small accomplishments in the world. With the rapid development of the domestic economy, it has become a high industrial pillar of the laser market, with an annual growth rate of over 20%. It has become a new starting point for the global laser market. Experts predict that the domestic laser market is still in a phase of rapid growth and may double in the future, maximizing the expansion of the laser cutting equipment market, allowing domestic high-end laser equipment to break out of the predicament and become a pillar of the international community. Currently, the domestic laser industry is mainly concentrated in Shenzhen and Wuhan, with Shenzhen being an important sales market in the country, leading other regions and having years of development experience. Although the laser industry has made significant progress and has been widely promoted and applied, there is still some room for growth in scale, especially for metal cutting machines and precision welding in precision industries such as automotive.