Robot Laser Cladding Machine

From those early days when first reached across the assembly line, robotic welding has flourished to become a permanent resident on the plant floor. Now, with the advent of high-power laser technologies at lower ownership costs, robotic laser welding is bringing more flexibility and productivity to the workspace. An often unsung hero, robotic laser cladding, is saving parts from the industrial salvage yard and fortifying new components. Its applications are remarkable in size and scope. Meanwhile, hybrid laser arc welding is making inroads with the promise of higher deposition rates. A dip into the pool of emerging technologies reveals remote laser welding, hot-wire laser cladding and laser additive manufacturing.

Higher speed, higher deposition rates and better first-run quality – all of that figures into getting the product finished in a shorter amount of time. Advances in laser technology over the last decade are exciting interest in laser welding processes. Giants in traditional welding are on board with the movement and even leading the way.

In a fiber laser, it's also a crystal that is excited, but they stretch it out so it's about 15 meters long and 10 microns in diameter. That eliminates some of the thermal management issues. Then, instead of exciting the crystal with lamps or light like in NdYAG, which is less efficient, they use a group of diode lasers that are fiber optically connected to that bigger fiber to excite it. A disk laser is also ytterbium-based, but they take that crystal and cut it to a very thin wafer, where a reflective side acts also as a heat sink. A large majority of laser cutting systems still use CO2 lasers, because the wattage per dollar is cheaper. Fiber is taking some of the cutting away from CO2 lasers. We'll have to wait and see how far it progresses into that market.

Manual laser welding is used in dental labs, medical device manufacturing, jewelry making and research. For most industrial applications, especially automotive, aerospace and heavy equipment manufacturing, robotic laser welding rules the day. Robot remote laser welding of an oven component assemtly for the appliance industry. From an industrial standpoint, almost every laser welding system is automated whether it's a hard or flexible automation system. As you increase speed and productivity, it's more difficult for a human to hold a welding gun and travel 50 to 60 inches per minute. But a robot or gantry has the ability to travel at high speeds, very fluidly, and with excellent path-following accuracy. With a human operator it's just beyond their motor function.

Laser welding is a consummate star in automotive manufacturing, the industry where robots first cut their teeth. What we don't see very often is laser cladding, where robots also prove their worth in precision and repeatability. Laser cladding is a welding process similar to thermal spraying in that it uses powdered metal as feedstock, which is applied to the substrate of a metal component either to protect or enhance its surface properties, or reclaim a worn or damaged dimension. Unlike thermal spraying, laser cladding uses a focused laser beam as the heat source. The result is a metallurgical bond between the substrate and the applied materials with superior bond strength, and in many cases, with surface properties superior to the original substrate. The main advantage is a small heat-affected zone (HAZ). This means less dilution, oxidation and decarburization, which can compromise the properties of the applied material and the component, and potentially cause cracking.