What kind of laser is suitable for cutting wood?
How does a laser cut wood
Laser-cut wood comes in two basic ways: instantaneous gasification and combustion.The way of laser cutting wood depends on the power density absorbed by the wood during laser cutting.Instantaneous gasification is an ideal way of wood cutting. The wood is vaporized under the irradiation of a focused laser beam to form a slit.Gasification cutting is characterized by fast cutting speed, less heat transfer on uncut substrate, no carbonization in profile, only slight darkening and glazing.The cutting method of combustion is mainly due to low beam power density, which is characterized by slower cutting speed, wider slit, larger cutting thickness, and smoke and coke odor.The energy consumed by cutting unit material in combustion mode is higher than that of gasification mode, and the cutting edge is carbonized.However, in the actual process of wood cutting, gasification is basically accompanied by combustion, because although gasification has the advantages of high efficiency, it requires a high power density to achieve it.However, in the actual laser irradiation process, due to the influence of laser output power and beam mode, the beam power density of some areas on the light surface of the material is always lower than the power density value required for gasification, so a small amount of combustion occurs.In addition, the laser cutting of wood also requires an auxiliary airflow coaxially with the beam, which is usually low pressure inert gas or air.
What type of laser should you choose to cut wood successfully?
Laser wood cutting is generally the use of CO2 laser, its wavelength is 10.6 m.However, the photoelectric conversion rate of CO2 laser is low (only 5% ~ 10%), and the energy consumption is relatively large.The laser needs frequent ventilation and the maintenance cost is high.External optical path is complex and difficult to install, debug and maintain.Therefore, CO2 laser has great limitation in the actual industrial production and application, and its application is becoming less and less.
The common optical fiber laser (wavelength 1 m) cutting sheet metal has become very common, so can this optical fiber laser be used to cut wood?If it's an erbium-doped fiber laser with a wavelength of 1 m, the answer is: It's hard.This is because the absorption of wood to 1 m wavelength laser is relatively low, difficult to form seam.
A new type of "thulium" element fiber laser should be selected. After "thulium" element is doped inside the fiber;The wavelength of the laser is 2 m.Wood, especially the moisture in wood, absorbs more water than the usual 1 m wavelength of the laser.
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