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Article

Effects of Top-hat Laser Beam Processing and Scanning Strategies in Laser Micro-Structuring

1
Department of Mechanical Engineering, University of Birmingham, Birmingham B15 2TT, UK
2
LASEA, Rue des Chasseurs Ardennais 10, 4031 Angleur, Belgium
*
Author to whom correspondence should be addressed.
Micromachines 2020, 11(2), 221; https://doi.org/10.3390/mi11020221
Received: 17 January 2020 / Revised: 17 February 2020 / Accepted: 18 February 2020 / Published: 20 February 2020
(This article belongs to the Special Issue 10th Anniversary of Micromachines)
The uniform energy distribution of top-hat laser beams is a very attractive property that can offer some advantages compared to Gaussian beams. Especially, the desired intensity distribution can be achieved at the laser spot through energy redistribution across the beam spatial profile and, thus, to minimize and even eliminate some inherent shortcomings in laser micro-processing. This paper reports an empirical study that investigates the effects of top-hat beam processing in micro-structuring and compares the results with those obtainable with a conventional Gaussian beam. In particular, a refractive field mapping beam shaper was used to obtain a top-hat profile and the effects of different scanning strategies, pulse energy settings, and accumulated fluence, i.e., hatch and pulse distances, were investigated. In general, the top-hat laser processing led to improvements in surface and structuring quality. Especially, the taper angle was reduced while the surface roughness and edge definition were also improved compared to structures produced with Gaussian beams. A further decrease of the taper angle was achieved by combining hatching with some outlining beam passes. The scanning strategies with only outlining beam passes led to very high ablation rates but in expense of structuring quality. Improvements in surface roughness were obtained with a wide range of pulse energies and pulse and hatch distances when top-hat laser processing was used. View Full-Text
Keywords: beam shapers; top-hat laser beam; gaussian laser beam; micro-structuring; pulse energy; hatch distance; pulse distance beam shapers; top-hat laser beam; gaussian laser beam; micro-structuring; pulse energy; hatch distance; pulse distance
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MDPI and ACS Style

Le, H.; Penchev, P.; Henrottin, A.; Bruneel, D.; Nasrollahi, V.; Ramos-de-Campos, J.A.; Dimov, S. Effects of Top-hat Laser Beam Processing and Scanning Strategies in Laser Micro-Structuring. Micromachines 2020, 11, 221. https://doi.org/10.3390/mi11020221

AMA Style

Le H, Penchev P, Henrottin A, Bruneel D, Nasrollahi V, Ramos-de-Campos JA, Dimov S. Effects of Top-hat Laser Beam Processing and Scanning Strategies in Laser Micro-Structuring. Micromachines. 2020; 11(2):221. https://doi.org/10.3390/mi11020221

Chicago/Turabian Style

Le, Hoang, Pavel Penchev, Anne Henrottin, David Bruneel, Vahid Nasrollahi, Jose A. Ramos-de-Campos, and Stefan Dimov. 2020. "Effects of Top-hat Laser Beam Processing and Scanning Strategies in Laser Micro-Structuring" Micromachines 11, no. 2: 221. https://doi.org/10.3390/mi11020221

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