Beam Diagnostics Improve Laser Heat Treatment Effectiveness

By Dick Rieley, Ophir Photonics

There are many different approaches to heat treating metals, many of which utilize a large furnace where an entire object is immersed in the heating process. To avoid the common problems of wasted energy and heating the entire instrument when only a portion needs to be treated, lasers have been used as an alternative approach to heat treatments. In order to get the highest quality heat treatments using lasers, it is important to understand the beam shape, the uniformity of the intensity, and the cleanliness of the delivery optics. This white paper discusses beam diagnostics with the use of Ophir’s BeamGage software used to improve laser heat treatment effectiveness.