Lab Story: Laser Measurement System For Stability And Quality

By Kevin Kirkham

The R&D lab of a large jet engine manufacturer uses a laser welding cell in order to test and develop new laser processes. They needed a solution to ensure the laser remained stable and of the best possible quality. 

Their lab has two main lasers, both in the near-IR (1 μm). One is a multimode laser with an M² of about 8, delivered through a 250 mm lens. The other is a 1 mm square top-hat beam, with an M² of about 100, scanned through an F-theta lens.

At Ophir, our go-to solution for cases of high power beam quality monitoring is usually to employ our BeamWatch solution, which uses Rayleigh scattering to view the beam size along its caustic. However, in this case the power density was too low for this solution to be effective. Instead, Ophir’s BeamSquared automatic M² beam quality measurement system was used.