Lecture+notes+AY+2018 Advanced Manufacturin Processes

Mechanical Engineering Master
ADVANCED MANUFACTURING PROCESSES
Lecture notes
AY 2018/‘19
Contents
I Waterjet 1
1 The system 1
1.1 Water treatment system .......................................................................................................................................... 1
1.2 Pumping system ...................................................................................................................................................... 2
1.2.1 General schematics ..................................................................................................................................... 3
1.2.2 Direct drive intensifier ............................................................................................................................... 3
1.2.3 Double acting intensifier ........................................................................................................................... 4
1.2.4 Single acting intensifier.............................................................................................................................. 6
1.2.5 Other possible intensifier solutions ......................................................................................................... 7
1.3 HP water transport system and connections ...................................................................................................... 8
1.4 Abrasive feeding system ........................................................................................................................................ 9
1.4.1 Abrasives .................................................................................................................................................... 10
1.5 Cutting heads ......................................................................................................................................................... 11
1.5.1 Cutting head for Pure Water Jet (PWJ) .......................................................................................... 11
1.5.2 Cutting head for Abrasive Water Jet (AWJ) ........................................................................................................ 12
1.5.3 Abrasive Suspension Jet .......................................................................................................................... 15
1.6 Handling System ................................................................................................................................................... 16
1.7 Catcher .................................................................................................................................................................... 16
2 Process parameters 17
2.1 Hydraulic parameters ........................................................................................................................................... 17
2.1.1 Pressure and velocity ............................................................................................................................... 17
2.1.2 Force Jet and Power ................................................................................................................................................ 18
2.1.3 Back Pressure ............................................................................................................................................. 19
2.2 Cutting parameters ............................................................................................................................................... 20
2.3 Mixing and acceleration parameters .................................................................................................................. 20
2.4 Abrasive parameters ............................................................................................................................................. 20
2.4.1 Abrasive-mass flow rate .......................................................................................................................... 20
2.4.2 Abrasive acceleration ............................................................................................................................... 20
2.4.3 Particle fragmentation .............................................................................................................................. 21
3 Kerf 23
3.1 Modeling kerf shape ............................................................................................................................................. 23
3.1.1 Model 2D.................................................................................................................................................... 23
3.1.2 Model 3D.................................................................................................................................................... 25
3.2 Influence of different parameter in kerf quality .............................................................................................. 26
3.2.1 Surface quality Ra ..................................................................................................................................... 26
3.2.2 Edge roundness ......................................................................................................................................... 28
3.2.3 Maximum cutting depth .......................................................................................................................... 29
3.2.4 Kerf width .................................................................................................................................................. 30
3.2.5 Taper ................................................................................................................................................................... 31
3.2.6 Uncut........................................................................................................................................................... 32
4 Previsional model 33
4.1 Different type of model ........................................................................................................................................ 33
4.2 Taper model............................................................................................................................................................ 33
4.3 Roughness model .................................................................................................................................................. 33
4.4 Cutting depth model............................................................................................................................................. 34
5 Economical aspects 35
5.1 Abrasive consumption cost.................................................................................................................................. 35
5.2 Water consumption cost ....................................................................................................................................... 35
5.3 Energy cost ............................................................................................................................................................. 36
I
5.4 Orifice and focusing nozzle costs ....................................................................................................................... 36
6 Application 36
II Hydroforming 38
7 Tube Hydroforming (THF) 38
7.1 Process sequence ................................................................................................................................................... 38
7.2 Process mechanics ................................................................................................................................................. 41
7.2.1 Stresses and strains................................................................................................................................... 41
7.2.2 State of stress ............................................................................................................................................. 41
7.2.3 State of strain ............................................................................................................................................. 42
7.3 Parameters: loading curves ................................................................................................................................. 43
7.3.1 Pressure ...................................................................................................................................................... 44
7.3.2 Bulging Pressure ....................................................................................................................................... 45
7.3.3 Calibration pressure ................................................................................................................................. 48
7.3.4 Die closing force........................................................................................................................................ 48
7.4 Defects ..................................................................................................................................................................... 49
7.5 Applications ........................................................................................................................................................... 50
7.6 Economical aspects................................................................................................................................................ 51
7.7 Design guidelines .................................................................................................................................................. 51
8 Sheet Hydroforming (SHF) 54

8.1 Flexforming ............................................................................................................................................................ 54
8.2 Hydromech ............................................................................................................................................................. 55
8.3 Applications ........................................................................................................................................................... 56
8.4 Advantages and disadvantages ........................................................................................................................... 56
8.5 Pressure in SHF ..................................................................................................................................................... 57
8.5.1 Pressure and internal radii ...................................................................................................................... 57
8.5.2 Pressure and blankholding force ........................................................................................................... 57
9 Hydroforming machines 59
III Ultrasonic machining process 60

10 USM 60
10.1 The material removal mechanism ....................................................................................................................... 60
10.2 The piezoelectric transducer ................................................................................................................................ 61
10.3 The magnetostrictive transducer ........................................................................................................................ 61
10.4 The sonotrode ........................................................................................................................................................ 63
10.5 Process parameters and MRR ............................................................................................................................. 64
10.6 Industrial applications .......................................................................................................................................... 67
11 Rotary ultrasonic machining 68
12 Ultrasonic welding 69
IV Cryogenic 72
13 Materials 72
13.1 Ti alloy .................................................................................................................................................................... 72
13.1.1 Machining problems................................................................................................................................. 72
13.1.2 Residual stress and cutting parameters ................................................................................................ 73
13.2 INCONEL ............................................................................................................................................................... 73
14 Tool life model 75
II
14.1 Cooling technology ............................................................................................................................................... 75
14.2 Tool wear ................................................................................................................................................................ 76
14.3 Taylor’s laws and cost model .............................................................................................................................. 76
15 Tools and solutions for machining 78

15.1 Shallow and depth cryogenic treatment............................................................................................................ 78
15.2 Machining setup .................................................................................................................................................... 78
V High performance in Machine Tools 80

16 MT system 81
17 MT Performance 81
17.1 Accuracy ................................................................................................................................................................. 82
17.2 Productivity ............................................................................................................................................................ 83
18 MT Dynamics 84
19 MT Vibrations 85
19.1 Regenerative Chatter............................................................................................................................................. 86
VI Laser 88
20 I
ntroduction 88
20.1 Physics of the laser................................................................................................................................................ 89
20.1.1 Wave formulation...................................................................................................................................... 90
20.1.2 Particle formulation .................................................................................................................................. 90
21 Laser operation mechanism 91

21.1 Pumping .................................................................................................................................................................. 92
21.1.1 Electrical pumping.................................................................................................................................... 92
21.1.2 Optical pumping ....................................................................................................................................... 93
21.1.3 Resonator .................................................................................................................................................... 93
21.1.4 Efficiency .................................................................................................................................................... 94
21.2 Properties of laser beam ....................................................................................................................................... 95
21.2.1 Monochromaticity ..................................................................................................................................... 95
21.2.2 Collimation................................................................................................................................................. 96
21.2.3 Beam Coherence ........................................................................................................................................ 96
21.2.4 Elevated Brightness .................................................................................................................................. 96
21.2.5 Small Beam diameter ............................................................................................................................... 97
21.2.6 Transverse Electromagnetic Mode TEM................................................................................................ 98
21.2.7 Temporal modulation .............................................................................................................................. 99
22 Thermal model 100

22.1 Heat transfer......................................................................................................................................................... 100
22.1.1 Fourier law .......................................................................................................................................................100
22.1.2 Newton law .....................................................................................................................................................101
22.1.3 First thermodynamic law .............................................................................................................................101
22.1.4 Boundary and initial conditions ........................................................................................................... 102
22.2 Solution for 1D problem .................................................................................................................................... 102
22.2.1 Solution: heating phase ......................................................................................................................... 103
22.2.2 Thermal distance ..................................................................................................................................... 104
22.2.3 Solution: cooling phase ......................................................................................................................... 104
23 Laser-material interaction 106
II
I
23.1 Power absorbed by the material ....................................................................................................................... 106
23.2 Coefficient of absorption .................................................................................................................................... 106
24 Methods of laser cutting 109

24.1 Laser ablation with pulsed laser ....................................................................................................................... 111
24.1.1 Cold ablation ........................................................................................................................................... 111
24.1.2 Hot ablation ............................................................................................................................................. 112
24.1.3 Melt expulsion ......................................................................................................................................... 112
24.2 Fusion cutting ....................................................................................................................................................... 113
24.2.1 Melt and blow cutting ........................................................................................................................... 113
24.2.2 Reactive fusion cutting .......................................................................................................................... 115
24.3 Vaporization cutting ........................................................................................................................................... 115
25 Laser cutting process and quality parameters 117

25.1 Spot size ................................................................................................................................................................ 117
25.2 Focal position ....................................................................................................................................................... 118
25.3 Effect of gas jet velocity (pressure) .................................................................................................................. 118
25.4 Material properties .............................................................................................................................................. 119
25.5 Quality parameters.............................................................................................................................................. 120
26 Laser sources 123

26.1 Gas laser sources ................................................................................................................................................. 123
26.1.1 Different CO2 laser design .................................................................................................................... 124
26.2 Solid-state laser sources ..................................................................................................................................... 125
26.2.1 Fiber laser ................................................................................................................................................. 126
26.2.2 beam focusing systems .......................................................................................................................... 129
27 Laser welding 131

27.1 General equipment .............................................................................................................................................. 132
27.2 Conduction welding ........................................................................................................................................... 133
27.3 Keyhole welding .................................................................................................................................................. 134
27.4 Process parameters .............................................................................................................................................. 135
27.4.1 Laser beam wavelength ......................................................................................................................... 136
27.4.2 Welding speed ......................................................................................................................................... 137
27.4.3 Focal position ........................................................................................................................................... 138
27.4.4 Joint geometries....................................................................................................................................... 139
27.4.5 Gap ............................................................................................................................................................ 139
27.4.6 Shroud gas properties ............................................................................................................................ 140
27.5 Comparison .......................................................................................................................................................... 141
28 O
ther laser applications 143
28.1 Laser marking ...................................................................................................................................................... 143
28.2 Laser hardening ................................................................................................................................................... 143
28.3 Laser cladding ...................................................................................................................................................... 144
28.3.1 Additive manufacturing ......................................................................................................................... 145
VII Plasma Arc Cutting 146

29 Introduction 146
29.1 Plasmas’ properties ............................................................................................................................................. 146
29.1.1 Debye Length ........................................................................................................................................... 146
29.1.2 Electromagnetic properties of plasmas ............................................................................................... 147
29.1.3 Electric discharge regimes ..................................................................................................................... 148
29.2 Classification of plasmas .................................................................................................................................... 148
30 P
I
V
lasma torch 150
30.1 From TIG welding to plasma cutting ............................................................................................................... 151
30.1.1 Nozzle-clogging ...................................................................................................................................... 152
30.2 Dry torch ............................................................................................................................................................... 153
30.2.1 Traditional problems............................................................................................................................... 153
30.3 Dual flow torch .................................................................................................................................................... 154
30.4 Water radial injection torch ............................................................................................................................... 154
30.4.1 Underwater plasma operation .............................................................................................................. 155
31 High Definition Plasma (HDP) 156

31.1 HDP system .......................................................................................................................................................... 157
31.1.1 Gas console: plasma gas properties .................................................................................................... 158
31.2 HDP machines ..................................................................................................................................................... 160
32 Process parameters 162

32.1 Gas flow rate / pressure ............................................................................................................................. 162
32.2 Arc current ........................................................................................................................................................... 163
32.3 Feed rate ................................................................................................................................................................ 163
32.4 Standoff distance ................................................................................................................................................. 165
33 Cutting quality 166

33.1 Taper and asymmetric kerf ................................................................................................................................ 166
33.2 Striations ............................................................................................................................................................... 168
33.3 Burrs ...................................................................................................................................................................... 168
33.4 Top spatter ............................................................................................................................................................ 169
33.5 Heat affected zone ............................................................................................................................................... 169
33.6 Surface finish ........................................................................................................................................................ 169
34 Applications 171
34.1 Plasma arc welding ............................................................................................................................................. 171
34.2 Plasma spray ........................................................................................................................................................ 172
34.2.1 Thermal spray deposition ..................................................................................................................... 172
34.3 Ultra-fine powder production ........................................................................................................................... 173
34.4 Other plasma coating processes: PVD and CVD........................................................................................... 173
34.4.1 Physical Vapor Deposition (or Sputtering) ......................................................................................... 174
34.4.2 Plasma enhanced CVD (PECVD) ......................................................................................................... 175
34.5 Other applications ............................................................................................................................................... 177
VIII Electric Discharge Machine 178

35 PLUNGE (or die-sinking) EDM 178
35.1 Process and System ............................................................................................................................................. 178
35.2 Configurations ..................................................................................................................................................... 179
36 Electric circuits 180

36.1 Lazarenko circuit ................................................................................................................................................. 180
36.2 Transistor circuit .................................................................................................................................................. 181
36.3 Discharge current profile ................................................................................................................................... 182
37 Material removal process 183
37.1 Ignition and Plasma formation ......................................................................................................................... 183
37.2 Discharge phase ................................................................................................................................................... 184
37.3 Ejection phase....................................................................................................................................................... 185
37.4 Process parameters: Lazarenko vs Transistor ................................................................................................ 185
37.5 Effect of the process parameters on quality.................................................................................................... 186
37.6 Surface morphology ............................................................................................................................................ 187
V
38 T
ools 189
38.1 Material ................................................................................................................................................................. 189
38.2 Tools wear ............................................................................................................................................................. 190
39 Dielectric fluid 191
40 A
pplications 191
41 WIRE EDM 193
42MICRO EDM 195

42.1 Macro vs Micro EDM ......................................................................................................................................... 195
IX Introduction to Additive Manufacturing processes 196

43Main features 196
44 A
M processes 198
44.1 Vat photopolymerization (SLA) ........................................................................................................................ 198
44.2 Powder bed fusion (SLS/SLM) .......................................................................................................................... 200
44.2.1 Selective Laser Sintering (SLS) ............................................................................................................. 200
44.2.2 Selective Laser Melting (SLM) .............................................................................................................. 201
44.3 Material extrusion (FDM) .................................................................................................................................. 202
44.3.1 FDM for plastic ....................................................................................................................................... 202
44.3.2 FDM for metals and ceramics............................................................................................................... 203
44.4 Directed energy deposition (DED) ................................................................................................................... 206
44.5 Comparison .......................................................................................................................................................... 207
45 Design rules for AM 208

45.1 Part quality issues ............................................................................................................................................... 209
V
I
Part I
Waterjet
1 The system
The main components of a WJ/AWJ system are:
1. Water treatment system, that filters water in order to make it with very low impurity before it enters in
the high water pressure unit;
2. Pumping system, composed by the hydraulic low and high water pressure unit;
3. High Pressure (HP) water transport system and connections, that conduct the water to the attenu-
ator;
4. Abrasive feeding system (AWJ), represented in Fig.1.20;
5. Cutting heads (strictly connected with point 4);

6. Handling system, that has the purpose to move the cutting head;
7. Catcher, in order to damping the residual energy of the jet.
1.1 Water treatment system

Water treatment system is done generally for save the life of the high pressure components that have direct
contact with the high pressure water (high pressure intensifier, primary nozzle and all pressure pipes).
There are 3 reasons related to the damage of these components:

1. Wear: the particles suspended in the water pipes would lead to an accelerated wear of the mechanical parts
of the intensifier, valves and sapphire orifice due to abrasion;
2. Obstruction: calcium and magnesium salts ,dissolved in the water, may deposit and so damage the parts
and the hydraulic efficiency of the system;
3. Corrosion: potential problem for metal parts due to the presence of chlorides and sulfates.
In order to reduce these issues, we have to pre-filter the water. The filtering is implemented with 3 different stages1:
1. Stage of softening and deionization: water passes on a stage of cationic resins which reduces the con-
centration of metal ions of calcium and magnesium (hardness); other types of resins reduce the presence of
chlorides and sulfates.
2. Filtering stage: an activated charcoal filter removes suspended solid particles and residual chlorine.
3. Reverse osmosis stage: osmosis process is the passage of water from a less concentrated solution to a more
concentrated solution through a semi-permeable membrane. Water tends to migrate from the lower to
the higher concentration and as an effect of this migration, we can measure a difference of pressure, called
Osmotic Pressure. In order to purify the water, it is necessary to get a reverse stream to extract fluid from a
solution yet full of impurities and so it is needed to impose a pressure higher than the osmotic pressure. In
this way, higher concentration of water is squeezed out and moving to the low concentration, water is filtered.
The first 2 stages remove the larger size of the particles from the amount of water, but they are not able to remove
smaller particles (i.e. in molecular scale) which are solute inside the water; these are removed through reverse
osmosis.
1Actually, some companies don’t implement all this 3 elements (for example reverse osmosis) due to costs associated.
1
Figure 1.1: Reverse Osmosis process.
1.2 Pumping system

• Pumping principle: high pressure intensifiers are based on the principle of pressure intensification (i.e.
forces equilibrium), as shown in Fig.1.2:
Pwater · Swater = Poil · Soil

where:
• Pwater S·water is the force applied on the cross-section of the smaller piston that pumps the high pressure
water;
• Poil · Soil is the force applied on the larger disk;
Soil
• Intensifier factor: ∼ 20.
=
Swater
Figure 1.2: Forces balance of two kinds of intensifiers.
2
1.2.1 General schematics
Figure 1.3: Schematic of the first 3 components (upstream from the cutting head).
In Fig.1.3, it is showed the most typical general layout of the 3 components that we mentioned before.
• There is an hydraulic pump that works with an oleo-dynamic mineral water, actuated by a very high power
electric motor, which absorbs a lot of energy;
• The fluid goes to a switch valve, that is programmed to open up the inline from 2 possible channels that go
respectively to the right and to the left of the double action intensifier;
• The mineral oil ( the yellow fluid) pushes from the right or from the left with a period of few seconds; if we
consider the cross-section, we can calculate the injection Force= Scross· Poil and so the out pressure of
the water dividing the force by the S of the small piston at the exit of the intensifier;
• Thanks to the hydraulic intensifying principle, the pressure goes from 20-30 MPa, of the hydraulic unit, up
to 400 MPa of the high-pressure WaterJet line.
1.2.2 Direct drive intensifier
Figure 1.4: Schematic drawing of a direct pump.
3
There is an engine directly connected to a crankshaft in order to pump the water which has 3 pistons that rotates
with 120° difference in phase.
It is characterized by a:
• high flow rate (even more than 100 l/min);
• limited pressure (tens of MPa) due to the costs related to the electrical engine. In fact, engines that exceed
a given power (∼30 kW) become very expensive, so this system is not implemented for larger pressures and
larger powers (where it is cheaper to use a indirect drive through a low pressure oil-pumping system).
1.2.3 Double acting intensifier
Figure 1.5: Schematic drawing of a double acting intensifier.
• Single acting intensifier with two active stroke per cycle2;

• There is a mechanical switch, controlled by a PLC, that works like a valve, activating alternatively one side
or other side of the double-action intensifier;
• Translated movement of the piston, to the right or to the left, opens up some channels that let pass the oil and
closes others (through valves); then, conversely, it moves to the other size closing and opening some channels
that come from the low pressure pump.
• In Fig.1.6 it is represented the entire schematic drawing: it is the part of the hydraulic circuit intended to
raising the water pressure to the levels of use (composed by four main parts).
• For reliability and cost reasons, the pump has two circuits:
– Low pressure circuit (orange): typical maximum pressure ∼ 20 MPa;

– High pressure circuit (dark blue): typical maximum pressure ∼ 400 MPa
2
Most commonly used.
4
Figure 1.6: Entire schematic drawing of the components of the double acting intensifier pumping system.
Figure 1.7: Example of a pumping system with double action intensifier.
In Fig.1.73, it is possible to see the water accumulator:
• it is an high pressure cylindrical vessel and it is very big for safety reasons (water volume in accumulator =2
lt);
• The period is≈ 2 seconds or less and the typical flow rate is about 2 l/min,
• it reduces water pressure fluctuations (as shown in Fig.1.9) and supplies missing water flow necessary for
processing in phases where the intensifier is not discharging water.
When we start pumping, the first thing to do is to fill entirely the accumulator with high pressure (∼ 100MPa).
It is very important because, before accumulator, if the pump decreases the pressure of water, there is a transient
that take sometimes and so the presence of accumulator can damp this fluctuations and compensate this pressure
drop (also pressurized piping could work as attenuators).
3
It is a closed structure because the system is very noisy.
5
Figure 1.8: Damping effect of the water accumulator.
As a consequence, we have to add the water accumulator downstream the water pump. Fluctuations are a
problem inherent with the double acting intensifier and there are 2 reasons for fluctuations:
• Oscillation problems by the alternative pumping cycles (i.e. alternative movement): when i want to change
the direction of my speed, there is respectively a deceleration and then an acceleration and during these
phases, we have a drop of pressure;
• Influence of water compressibility at high pressures (around 15% at 400 MPa): when we start the cycle, we
do not only accelerate the fluid, but sometimes the pressure applied is needed to compress the water
Figure 1.9: Pressure signal measured up to the double acting intensifier pump (∆P = 6 Mpa and
frequency≡frequency of the machine).
1.2.4 Single acting intensifier
Figure 1.10: Scheme of single acting intensifier.

In single acting intensifier (one active stroke per cycle) the problem of alternative movement is worst: i do not
only reverse the movement but there is one backstroke where there is no pumping at all.
In this system, we need at least 3 single-acting intensifier in parallel and properly phased in order to give a
continuous pumping and avoid the possible problem of no-pumping related to the alternative movement (if there is
only one, we have a pressure drop). As a consequence, the accumulator is not strictly necessary.
6
Considering the pumping cycle in Fig.1.11, we can see that, in Step 1:
• cylinder 1 is pumping at the beginning, because we have the displacement of the piston head that moves away
from the Bottom Dead Center (BDC) up to the Top Dead Center (TDC);
• cylinder 2 is pre-compressed with a certain pressure so has to have a certain displacement and be prepared
for Step 2;
• cylinder 3 is discharged to the BDC in order to fill the chamber again;
In Step 2,while cylinder 1 starts to move backwards, cylinder 2 starts immediately to go up to TDC and cylinder
3 is pre-compressed, and so on.
By this way, pressure fluctuations are automatically damped and so it is not needed anymore the presence
of an accumulator that is an expensive and an high-pressure dangerous component.
Figure 1.11: Pumping cycle of 3 single acting intensifier in parallel, properly phased.
1.2.5 Other possible intensifier solutions

• 6 single acting intensifiers (120 HP): Multiplying the cylinders, we can have:
– a robust system increasing reliability and availability (and also maintenance): we can reduce the
number of working pistons to 3 and if one piston goes to be repaired, we can work with the others 5;
– more flow rate with the same level of pressure: it is very useful when we have a machine with multiple
cutting head because we don’t have to buy new pumps.
• Multiple double acting intensifiers (for example, 4 double acting intensifier groups):
– the intensifiers are phased in order to not need accumulators;
– we can obtain high-pressure (690 MPa) but it is a very expensive machinery.
• Electric intensifiers: in Direct drive there is a limit related to the costs of the electric motor above a certain
kW range; the idea is to have the same movement of the piston but now it is electrically actuated (instead
of hydraulically actuated). So we use an electric servo motor that gives the energy for the movement and
drives directly alternatively the two side pistons as in a double acting intensifier (the piston is electrically
conducted). Advantages are:
– elimination of 3 hydraulic units with an electrical device: so, even if at the beginning there are more costs
related to the electric servo motor, then the maintenance cost is lower; in fact, hydraulic and oil-dynamic
units go down very frequently;
– best mechanical and energetic efficiency;a
– elimination of the oil circuit with its maintenance issues;
– reducing power consumption of about 50% (even if there are most costs related to the motor).
7
Figure 1.12: Scheme of an electric intensifier.
1.3 HP water transport system and connections

The high pressure piping transports the fluid until the cutting head and they are exposed to high stresses. There
are two types of High Pressure pipes:
1. Rigid steel pipes:
• they are made by stainless steel (for example, AISI 316), with typical inner diameter∼ 3mm (but they
can have different sizes according to the applications).
• they are subjected to a treatment called autofrettage treatment, used to prolong the average life (in
order to avoid to replace them frequently):
Figure 1.13: Gradient of pressure and residual stress after autofrettage.
• we take the tube and we pressurize it at a very high pressure larger than the pressure that we use in the
system;
• Since that the tube is thick, the equivalent pressure, that takes place inside the tube, has a gradient
because it will be larger in the internal values than in the outsider values: as a consequence, only the
internal zone enters in the plastic region (as shown in Fig.1.13);
• the material in plastic field is in continuity with the part in the elastic field (that it isn’t deformed) and
so, when we remove the pressure it remains a residual compressive state of stress internally: in the
inside of the tube, there is an high hoop compressive stress while, in the outside, there is a moderate
hoop tensile stress and so, the elastic material outside works like a belt;
• thanks to this effect, the fatigue life increases (fatigue is the main cause of failure of these components)
and so also the reliability of the system.
8
Figure 1.14: Residual stress after autofrettage.
• Pipes can have a spiral shape (spirals with a very large radius) when they have to give a relative motion,
thanks to their elasticity, between different components of the systems. For example, in Fig.1.15, there
are represented the spirals, that come from the accumulator, needed for alloy the movement of the cutting
head in the x direction (however, in the nearby of the cutting head, flexible tubes are preferred).
Figure 1.15: Spirals for cutting head movement.
2. Flexible pipes:
• They are flexible hoses made by several layers (up to 8) of rubber and metal wires, oriented with different
directions. This allows some flexibility (and so i do not need spirals as used in rigid pipes), but of course
there is also a minimum radius under to witch the pipes could break.
• They can stay at a low little pressure (close to∼ 600Mpa) than rigid tubes.
Figure 1.16: Layers of concentric steel wires twisted in a rubber matrix for flexible hoses.
1.4 Abrasive feeding system

We have hopper that feed abrasive to the cutting head. It can be:
9
Figure 1.17: Abrasive hopper feeding systems.
• Off-board the machine: they need to be drained using gravity or have to be pump with pressurized air;
• Next to the cutting head: they work like local buffer of abrasive material. There is a regulating wheel that
can rotate and for each index position, it offer to the nozzle a different diameter; by changing the diameter,
it provides larger or smaller amount of abrasive material. Typically, abrasive flow rate ranges are from 50 to
500 g/min.
Most typical designed is discrete off-line calibration through calibrated holes (Fig.1.18); there is also a so called
continuous open-loop in-line flow rate calibration that works changing continuously the abrasive flow rate but it
isn’t so used.
Figure 1.18: Example of discrete off-line calibration.
1.4.1 Abrasives
Main requirements for abrasive materials are:
• High hardness;
• Homogeneous dimensions;
• Low higroscopicity : it doesn’t absorb humidity.
Material sizes go from 40 to 200 mesh number and 80 is the average mesh number (corresponding to 180 µm in
average size). Most diffused material is garnet:
• it is less expensive because it is a natural material;
10
• it is a three-components material, made by oxides; in particular:
– SiO2(silicium oxide): main component about 36%;

– Al 2O2: called allumina, about 20%
– F eO: iron oxide about 30%
When we buy abrasive and do the granulometry measurements, we find a size distribution as shown in Fig.1.19.
This is a problem because we have the same nominally abrasive but different curves and so different cutting material
abilities. As a consequence, each companies used to have a personal supplier; so, they buy very rough low mesh
number abrasives and also very high mesh number and then they produce their own mixture in order to be sure
about the abrasive material.
Figure 1.19: Distribution of particle size for a vine nominal mesh #.
1.5 Cutting heads

We can have different configuration of water jet cutting head
Figure 1.20: Types of WaterJet systems
1.5.1 Cutting head for Pure Water Jet (PWJ)

When we have Pure Water Jet cutting head, the main features are:
• Relative low pressure range: 200-300 MPa;
• Very small primary nozzle: 0.08 mm< d0 <0.2 mm. The smaller is the diameter of the primary nozzle:
– the smaller will be the curve inside the material that we want to see (as an example, for cutting card-
board);
– the smaller is the risk for the material to getting wet;
11
• Jet velocity∼600-700 m/s;
Figure 1.21: Applications and scheme of PWJ.
The orifice inserts are usually made of sapphire (working life 100 hours) or diamond (working life 300 h and
are more expensive). They are made by fragile material and so when they are worn out, there is a catastrophic
event because they sudden break and we can’t use them anymore: their irregularities (visible in Fig.1.22), due to
wear out, completely change the directions and the quality of the output water jet.
In order to prevent it, since there isn’t a slow wear process, they have to be changed often before their breaking.
Figure 1.22: Orifice inserts and wear process.
1.5.2 Cutting head for Abrasive Water Jet (AWJ)

In Abrasive Water Jet, in advanced to primary nozzle, also the mixing tube and the mixing chamber insert become
spare parts. Typical average main features are:
• Orifice diameter: 0.2-0.33 mm (larger than the primary nozzle of PWJ);
• Focuser diameter: 1 mm;

• Working pressure: up to 600 MPa;
• Abrasive size 170 µm;
12
Figure 1.23: General components of an injected cutting head.
Mixing chamber, builds by two components:

• Mixing chamber housing, made by steel;
• Mixing chamber insert, smaller component located inside the mixing chamber housing; it is a wear compo-
nent that must be replace time by time and it is made by very hard material like tungsten carbide. Since
it is a consumable part, it’s designed so that we have only to replace it and not the entire mixing chamber
(which is expensive);
Figure 1.24: Wear components and scheme of AWJ.
The mixing tube has the function to promote the momentum transfer from water jet to abrasive particles and
create an homogeneous and collimated out-flowing hydro-abrasive jet.
• it is made by sinthered tungsten\boron carbide (high resistance to abrasion);
• it has a working life around 100 hours;
• internal diameter can be 0.76,1,1.2 mm and his length can be 50,76,100 mm;
13
In this solution the cutting head isn’t symmetric and so the abrasive will not be on the center of the jet. The
presence of the abrasive feeling system introduces a lot of air in the mixing chamber, that is both a positive and a
negative fact according to the following points:
• the air flow fate is necessary to supply the abrasive at the WaterJet with the Venturi effect
• the final jet is composed by 95% of air and only the other 5% of water and abrasive4. This high presence of
air decrease the specific energy of the jet and, once outside the mixing tube, the jet could diverge.
So the result is a jet with a low cutting ability and without homogeneous properties.
Contrary to the primary nozzle, it can be used also when it is worn out. It starts to wear out at the entrance
edge but, since it is a long component, it has the time to readjust the trajectory of the particles and transfers the
kinetic energy.
• Inizial shape: conical region + cylindrical region;
• As soon as it wears out, it starts to get the shape represented in Fig.1.25; there are typically 3 portions:
– 1st portion in still conical but larger;
– then 2 rounded portions: most accredited theory thinks that it is due to some bouncing of the abrasive
particles coming from the mixing chamber; the first of these two regions, it might be region when the
material bounces more frequently and after the second, particle starts to follow the straight trajectory
(where we have no more bouncing).
Figure 1.25: Wear in mixing tube.
Some alternatives at this configuration are shown in figure 1.26. The first system (starting from the left) uses a
central abrasive feeling tube and 4 high pressure water injectors around this. The second and the third examples
show other different way to obtain a symmetric cutting head and so a symmetric jet with the abrasive on the center.
All these systems resolves the problem of the abrasive distribution inside the jet, but they all still have a lot of air
inside them.
4
These are indicative values but they can change according to the system
14
Figure 1.26: Injection AWJ cutting head with the abrasive on the center of the jet
1.5.3 Abrasive Suspension Jet

A solution to the air problem is provided by the Abrasive Suspension Jet (ASJ) that use a system fully pressurized
and without air. The system (figure 1.27) is composed by a pressurized vessel that contains the abrasive which is
in suspension with the water supplied by the pump. There is a by-pas that direct a part of the water flow rate to
the vessel and so push the water-abrasive mixture to the nozzle.
The main problems of this system are that:
• to refill the system with new abrasive I have to stop it and open the vessel. The capacity of this component
is limited and so the working time in general il lower than an hour (frequent downtimes)
• the abrasive concentration on the cutting jet isn’t constant: in particular it is maximum at the beginning of
the process and minimum at the end. This imply a variable cutting quality during the time
• due to the construction of the system the components have a higher wear than in the injected waterjet
(frequent maintenance)
• The maximum pressure is limited to 2000 bar but the jet has a higher specific energy due to the absence of
the air
Compared to the Injection technology, the ASJ uses a bigger nozzle due to the presence of abrasive in this. The
nozzle diameter in general is 0,6-2 mm, compared to 0,25-0,5 mm for the injection WJ.
The ASJ technology, due to the problem we have explained, isn’t a economical sustainable alternative at the
injection waterjet and so it is used only for particular applications. In particular it is used for the underwater
cutting5 and for realize small and portable devices6.
5Forexample for decommissioning off-shore structures
6
Used for example by the firefighters
15
Figure 1.27: Abrasive Suspension Jet system
1.6 Handling System

The handling system has the purpose to move the cutting head in 2-3 directions and sometimes it can also rotate
in one or another direction (5-axis cutting); Adding the rotation axis in necessary to improve the quality of the cut.
1.7 Catcher
• The catcher is used to:
– damp and dissipate the residual energy of the jet (up to 75% of the initial energy), in order to avoid to
cut more than what we expect;
– Avoid jet back reflections;
– Noise reduction (especially in submerged AWJ cutting)
– Catch and flush the machining scraps;
• It can be represented with two different layout:
1. Catcher tank (shown in Fig.1.28), that can contain several hundreds liters of water. There is a metal
grid (sometimes could be replaced) and below it there is a very large water tank that, in addition to the
damping effect, collects the fragments of material/abrasive particles which has to be removed (it must
be cleaned time by time);
2. Movable Catcher (synchronized with the cutting head) : it is a tube, rather than a tank, that follow the
cut and collects the particles. It is more complicated because we have also to move the tube and not
only the cutting head.
Figure 1.28: Most typical layout of a very large catcher tank and an handling system with 2 cutting heads.
16
2 Process parameters
2.1 Hydraulic parameters
2.1.1 Pressure and velocity
In the waterJet technology the cutting power is provided by a high pressure jet of water. The pressure supplied by
the intensifier is converted into kinetic energy thanks the primary nozzle due to the Bernoulli equation
1 2
P+ ρv + ρgh = constant
2
Applying this relation between the sections immediately after and immediately before the orifice we can calculate
the jet velocity. Due to the negligible input velocity and the small difference of h we can simplify the equation and
obtain the theoretical velocity of the jet
vth = 2P
ρ0
In this equation appears ρ0 because we are neglecting the water compressibility, but due to the high pressure
this is not a good approximation. So we can introduce the coefficient of compressibility ψ to obtain the theoretical
water jet velocity for a compressible fluid vth,c.
vth,c = ψ · vth
If we also consider the friction losses in the orifice we can introduce the velocity coefficient Cv to obtain the real
velocity of the jet
vj = Cv · vth,c
In the primary nozzle, increasing the velocity with a reduction a section, we have also the vena contracta
phenomena (fig. 2.1) and we take in account of this with the contraction coefficient Cc.
Sj j
= dd22
Cc = n
S0
Figure 2.1: Primary nozzle with the vena contracta phenomena
We can use this coefficient and the velocity of the jet to calculate the real water flow rate.
2P 2P
Qw = Sj · vj = Cc · ψ · Cv · = Cd ·
· S0 · Sn
ρ0 ρ0
Where we had introduced the overall coefficient of discharge Cd, that is the product of the three coefficient, that
depends on the geometry, on the inlet radius and on the orifice edge condition. In figure 2.2 are represented some
example for different geometry.
17
Figure 2.2: Example of coefficient of discharge for given geometry
In the following table we resume the typical values of these coefficients.
Coefficient Standard WaterJet Suspension WaterJet

ψ 0,95 0,98
Cv 0,98 0,91
Cc 0,65 - 0,75 1
Cd 0,65 - 0,7 0,9
As we can see the suspension WaterJet has an higher general efficiency, but it can operate at a lower pressure
than the other configuration.
2.1.2 Force Jet and Power

The reaction force of the jet is given by the change of momentum of the water on the primary nozzle, between the
initial velocity (negligible) and the final one
F = ṁw · vj = ρ0 · Qw · vj
Substituting on this equation the previous results we obtain
π
F = · C · C 2· ψ 2· d 2 · P
c
2 v n
In general the reaction force F :
• increase linearly with the pressure P

• decrease if the nozzle diameter decreases
• decrease increasing the abrasive mass flow rate
18
Figure 2.3: Reaction force
Then we can calculate the hydraulic power with the following expression
1
Phydr = · ṁ w · v2j
2
Where ṁw = ρ0 · Q0
2.1.3 Back Pressure

The cutting head is characterized by different values of velocity and pressure in the different components. In the
inlet tube is present the pressure supplied by the pump, that in general is 2000 - 4000 bar (up to 6000 bar), that
will be converted into the jet velocity. If the mixing chamber is completely sealed, the pressure reached in this
region tends to the vacuum (Pv ). Otherwise, if there is the abrasive feeding system on work, the pressure reached
in this region is higher than in the previous case and lower than the ambient pressure (Pa). So, as a general rule,
we can say that the pressure in the mixing chamber:
• increase increasing the abrasive flow rate

• decrease increasing the pump pressure
But, if we have reached a pressure in the mixing chamber near the vacuum and we continue to increase the pump
pressure, we will not see a further reduction of this pressure. This happens at the critical jet pressure Pcr that
depends on the back pressure PB .
PB
Pcr = 2
dn ( n2
d
2· ·C ·C · 1−
d d
2 D v 2
m m
Where dm is the diameter of the mixing tube and CD the drag coefficient. With this equation we could calculate
the critical jet pressure, but it depends on the back pressure that is very difficult to estimate. So, with the pressure
ratio N and the ratio of mass flow rates M we can obtain the empirical diagram shown in figure 2.4.
P B − Pv
N=
P − Pv
ṁa
M=
m˙ w
19
Figure 2.4: Back pressure diagram
We can see that to avoid the back pressure in particular we have to limit the abrasive mass flow ratio, that is
the main cause of friction on the mixing tube. The critical pressure ratio Ncr is the limit over that (so for N > Ncr )
backflow will occur.
d ( d
N = 2 · 2 n · C · C · 1 − 2n
d d
cr 2 D v 2
m m
2.2 Cutting parameters

• Traverse rate
• Number of passes: it can be greater then one only if H is smaller then the thickness of the material
• Standoff distance
• Impact angle
2.3 Mixing and acceleration parameters

• Focus diameter df : it influence the kerf width (subsec. 3.2.4 )
• Focus length: it influence the maximum cutting depth (subsec. 3.2.3)
2.4 Abrasive parameters

2.4.1 Abrasive-mass flow rate
The abrasive flow rate in generally is around hundred g/min, according to the cut quality we want to obtain. We
can also define the abrasive loading ratio with the following relation
ṁa
ra =
ṁw
2.4.2 Abrasive acceleration

One of the main purpose of the mixing tube is to accelerate the abrasive particles inside the waterjet. The particles
start from a very low velocity (that can be approximated to zero) and on a ideal mixing reach the same velocity of
the water. Due to accelerate the particle it is required a force that can be calculated as
1
FP = · ρ0 · SP · (vw − va)2
2
Where SP is the cross section of the abrasive particle and ρ0 the density of the water.
To calculate the ideal abrasive velocity we can write an overall momentum balance for each position x from the
beginning of the mixing:
ṁ w · vj (0) = ṁw · vj (x) + ṁa · va (x)

20
In this equation we have neglected the initial velocity of the abrasive and the contribution of the air because
they are very low compared to the other terms. If a full mixing between abrasive and water is reached they have
the same velocity, so we can calculate the final velocity of the jet
ṁw
vend = · vj (0)
m˙ w + ṁa
This velocity is reached only in a ideal mixing in fact a infinite mixing tube should be necessary. I real application
we obtain a jet in which the water is faster than the abrasive and so we can define the mixing afficiency as:
va va
λ vel = v = v /(1 + r
a,max j
a)
Figure 2.5: Example of water and abrasive velocity evolution inside the mixing tube
To measure the real abrasive velocity, ferromagnetic particles can be used with an electromagnetic system of
measurement.
2.4.3 Particle fragmentation

Inside the mixing tube the friction and the shocks between the abrasive and the wall of the tube determine a
reduction of the particle dimension. This phenomena increases if the abrasive isn’t on the center of the jet or if
there is a misalignment between the jet and the tube. The fragmentation reduces the cutting ability of the jet
and increase the mixing tube wear. In figure 2.6 we can see that inside the abrasive the number of small particle
increases (high mesh number).
Figure 2.6: Fragmentation: changing of the abrasive dimension

Other abrasive parameters are:
21
• Abrasive-particle diameter
• Abrasive-particle size distribution

• Abrasive-particle shape
• Abrasive-particle hardness
That we have previously covered in subsec. 1.4.1
22
3 Kerf
3.1 Modeling kerf shape
3.1.1 Model 2D
The kerf shape will depend on the 3 parameters:
1. Type of material
2. Velocity (kinetic energy)

3. Direction, shape and size of the particle
Figure 3.1: Brittle fracture
For brittle material like glass, marble, ceramic and steel, when the particle hit the surface it generate a stress
on the material with propagate in the material throw shortwaves and can fracture it. The amount of kinetic energy
transformed in stress during the impact depends on the direction of the impact:
• If the particle hit the surface in a perpendicular way, all the kinetic energy will be transformed in stress σ
• If the particle hit the surface with an angle, only a slice of kinetic energy will be transformed in stress σ,
another part of energy will be transformed in shear stress τ . The larger the τ the more difficult is to cut the
material
For ductile material we can identify 2 different mechanism of ductile fracture that are more likely to occur when
the direction of impact is tangential to the surface of the material to cut:
Figure 3.2: Ductile fracture
1. Cutting: in this case the particle called Garnet will hit the material and rotate working like a traditional
cutting tool7 and it will remove the material by severe plastic deformation creating a chip and eventually this
chip will fracture too.
2. Ploughing: this type of fracture happens with extremely ductile materials. The particle hitting the surface
will not break the material but it will create a lip and will induce a plastification on the surface and as a
consequence the material would have a layer of residual stress. It is more likely to have ploughing if the garnet
has a spherical shape.
7like milling
23
Focusing on the kerf shape, we can distinguish two different zone like showed in Fig 3.3
1. Direct impact zone: in this zone, on the right of Fig 3.3, the removal process occurs mainly by fragile fracture
and by ploughing deformation. We can see the particles hitting the surface of the material perpendicularly,
this will induce a brittle fracture but it can lead to some particles bouncing back and hitting the nozzle, that’s
why there is always a protection. Other particle could hit the surface tangentially and they will abrade the
edge of the cutting curve due to the bouncing.
2. Centrifugal abrasion zone: in this zone, on the left side, the material removal process occurs by inertial
grining process similar to the sliding abrasion. We have the material already cut and some particle will
bounce, and each time they will hit the kerf, they will lose kinetic energy and maybe mass changing the angle
of impact, so that’s why the kerf has this shape like in Fig 3.3
Figure 3.3: Kerf zone for aluminum material
The shape of the kerf is determined by the ratio between the transverse feed rate v and the vertical removal rate
r˙. If this ratio is constant we will have a triangular cutting curve. But this ratio is not constant, it is different as
we move downward because the cutting mechanism will become slower due to the loosing energy, so the triangular
shape will become a curved shape curved backward.
Figure 3.4: Shape of the kerf related to the ratio between the feed rate and the vertical removal rate
One possible model to estimate8 r˙ is:
µσva
r˙ = σ
f
where µ is the friction coefficient (we don’t know), σ is the normal stress (we don’t know), σf is the material
strength property, va is the abrasive particle velocity (we don’t know)
We have different quality region on the cutting curve:
8
The estimation of r˙ is important to know the shape of the kerf curve.
24
• Smooth cutting zone: regular zone with regular waviness on the top of the cutting curve
• Transition zone: transitional zone really rough

• Rough cutting zone: in the material are dig channels due to inertial grounding
Figure 3.5: Side wall of the cutting cure
3.1.2 Model 3D
Some water jet machine could have 5 axis movement: 3 for translation and 2 for rotation, so in order to improve the
cutting quality we can use this other degrees of freedom in order to compensate for a negative or positive cutting
kerf. If we want to cut a shape in a sheet of metal and we are interesting only in the internal part, the best way to
maintain an high feed rate without increasing the taper and decreasing the cutting quality is to inclined the jet as
we can see in fig. 3.6. In this way we have an almost vertical cutting wall in the shape that we wants and a lower
quality in the metal that we are not using. In this way for example in order to cut a circular crown we will cut the
external circumference clockwise and the internal anticlockwise.
Figure 3.6: Comparison between a vertical axis water jet and one with an inclination to compensate
Figure 3.7: 3D cutting kerf
Most CAM software will model the water jet as a cylinder, but this is only an approximation because the real
jet will have a backflow with a backward inclination and a divergence.
25
Figure 3.8: Comparison between how CAM software model the ideal and real kerf
3.2 Influence of different parameter in kerf quality

We can make a distinction of the process parameters that influence the cutting quality:
1. Fixed parameters9:
• h : the thickness of the sheet
• Material
2. Hard to change parameters:
• dn : diameter of the primary nozzle

• df : diameter of the focusing nozzle
• The geometry of the cutting head
3. Variable parameters10:
• Pressure
• Transfer speed
• Abrasive flow rate
• Mesh size of the abrasive
3.2.1 Surface quality Ra
Figure 3.9: Example of surface roughness
Ra is the roughness topology parameters. We have a measuring length divided in 7 sub units, there is a stylus
touching the surface and measuring the height. We need at least 3 distinct value of Ra to ha a complete character-
ization of Ra. The position is printed in the chart and the first and last measurement are deleted. The zero of the
chart can be drawn only after the measurement because the zero position can be calculated only after we make the
integral of the curve and we have that the top areas equal to the area below the zero. After that we can calculate
Ra as the mean arithmetic value of the vertical distance from zero in absolute therms.
The surface quality improves when Ra decrease and this happen when we have better cutting ability, so when:
• Increase:
– Water pressure: increasing pressure we can cut better, faster and bigger sheets
9Maybe they are decided from the costumer
10
Variable that we will include in our cost model because they are the variable that will rapidly change. Our goal is to minimize the
cost because usually we have a constrain on the Ra
26
– Abrasive flow rate: if the abrasive flow rate increases we have more energy so the cutting ability will
increase. The smaller the abrasive flow rate the larger the Ra will be. The influence of this parameter
will be more relevant in the bottom than in the top.
Figure 3.10: Increase of flow rate leads to decrease of Ra
• Decrease:
– Feed rate11: if we decrease cutting speed the ratio between the transfer feed v and r˙improves, so the
quality improves. if the increase the feed rate we have less time to remove the material at the same
location so the quality decrease
Figure 3.11: Increase of feed rate leads to an increase of Ra
– Measured depth
Figure 3.12: Increase of Ra with the increase of the total cutting depth
11It is the most important parameter. If all is fixed and you have to change something, change the feed rate
27
– Particle size: if we decrease the particle size the mass of each particle will decrease, so the kinetic
energy of each particle will decrease, so the cutting ability of each single particle will be smaller. But
if the cutting ability of a single particle is smaller, we are increasing the abrasive flow rate so we have
more particle so the quality will be better. Increasing the particle size there are less particle but bigger
so we are hitting the material in a more rough way so the quality decrease
Figure 3.13: Increasing in particle size leads to an increase of Ra
– Focuser diameter d m: if we decrease the focuser diameter we have more friction in the nozzle with
larger back pressure, but the energy that we keep is more concentrated on a tiny region, so the energy
density will be larger
The same thing can be said for the waviness that is measurement of the irregularity of the surface when the
irregularity is very large. It is measured with the same instrument used to measure the Ra, but it is measured only
on the bottom.
Figure 3.14: Decreasing the feed rate and increasing the abrasive mass flow rate the waviness decrease
3.2.2 Edge roundness
Figure 3.15: Edge roundness
The corner radius is due to the initial bouncing of the water jet particle
28
3.2.3 Maximum cutting depth
Figure 3.16: Cutting depth
Non cutting throw water jet is not used because the bottom surface is very irregular.
The maximum cutting depth kmax will increase if
• Increase:
– Water pressure: we can see in fig 3.17 that the shape of the curve will change with the pressure,
increasing kmaxwith an increase of pressure. The point of maximum will shirt rightward
– Abrasive flow rate: if we increase the abrasive flow rate we will increase kmax up to a given point.
Over it there will form clogging due to the excessive flow rate that will induce a larger back pressure and
frictional effects
Figure 3.17: Variation of kmax with the variation of the abrasive feed rate and pressure
• Decrease:
– Feed rate:
– Focuser length: if the focusing length changes we are non linearly changing the properties of the jet,
if we have and ideal cutting length, it is optimal respect to the velocity and acceleration of the jet, but
in general the producer will make it longer in order to collimate better. If we go over this length we will
have a larger back pressure and then we will have frictional effects inside the water jet. So there is a
saturation of this improvement.
In fig 3.18 as we move up we have the ratio between the diameter of the mixing tube dm and the diameter of the
dm
nozzle dn . In the companies they use and optimal ratio that is dn = 3.04 that because with this value the process
is more robust in small changes and more predictable. So the user will appreciate the stability of the suction process
that is always unstable. They also see that back flow happen when the focusing nozzle is not too small
29
Figure 3.18: Variation of kmax with the variation of the abrasive feed rate and the ratio between dm and dn
3.2.4 Kerf width
Figure 3.19: Kerf width
Kerf width is not constant but we will take the average calculated on several measurement
The kerf width and taper are strictly connected because, in order to reduce the kerf width we have to reduce
the cutting ability12, but in doing so we will increase the taper. We will try to obtain a small kerf width with small
feed rate and big water pressure and abrasive flow rate13, so the only parameters free is the focuser and orifice
diameters.
The kerf width will decrease14 if we:
• Increase:
– Feed rate
• Decrease:
– Water pressure
– Abrasive flow rate
– Focuser and orifice diameters: if we use a smaller focuser and orifice diameters we are reducing the
cutting ability, but we will concentrate the power in a smaller surface area.
12
it is in contrast with the previous parameters in which, in order to improve quality, we wanted to improve cutting ability
13
All of this is the opposite of what we want to decrease the kerf width
14The smaller the kerf width the better will be. That is in contrast with maximizing the maximum cutting depth.
30
Figure 3.20: Variation of kerf width with the variation of feed rate and abrasive flow rate
3.2.5 Taper
Figure 3.21: Kerf taper
The kerf taper is often positive like in fig 3.21, it can be defined as an angle or as a difference of the cutting width
from the top to the bottom.
The taper 95 % of the time is positive. Our goal will be to have a taper equal to zero. In some rare case with
material that are really easy to cut and extremely slow trasfer speed in respect to r˙ we can have a negative taper
having a jet stationary in a position.
Figure 3.22: Different types of taper
The kerf taper will decrease if we increase the cutting ability of the water jet, so if we:
• Increase:
– Water pressure
– Abrasive flow rate
• Decrease:
– Feed rate
– Focuser diameter
– Mesh size
31
3.2.6 Uncut
the uncut triangle when the cutting curve goes upward and and r˙ instantaneously equal the water jet velocity
Figure 3.23: Uncut
32
4 Previsional model
In this section we will describe some empirical model about process parameters that are easy to change in order
to describe the quality. We are doing a simplification because we are considering only 3 numbers of the 6 described
in the previous subsection 3.2 and we also reducing the process parameter down to 5 described in the section 2.
4.1 Different type of model

Before starting with some example, let’s discuss about different types of model
We can have
1. Mathematical model:
(a) Theoretical: if this problem has a close solution (easy to compute or numerical) is cheap and it is good
because it not depend on the experimental range. Otherwise the solution will be not really accurate
(b) Empirical: this type of model has a really high cost do to the high amount of experiment needed in
order to compute and empirical formula. This formula will work only in a determinate range
(c) Semi-empirical: this type of model is the most effective because it links the quality of the theoretical
and the empirical model. With semi-empirical model we have at first a theoretical analysis that is made
more correct due to the introduction of a empirical constant. An example of this model is the water jet
velocity vj = Cv · vth in wich Cv in an empirical constant and vth a theoretical relation.
2. Conceptual and logical model: this type of model are composed of visual blocks and they are really useful
for schematic drawing of manufacturing process and to create a visual map of your constrain and variables
you are dealing with
Figure 4.1: Example of conceptual model
3. Realistic model: a realistic model is a prototype and it is really useful to prove for example if the analytical
solution to our problem is correct
4.2 Taper model


 Water pressure 
Feed rate
T =f  
 Abrasive flow rate 
Mesh #
4.3 Roughness model
 eed rate 
Ra = f 
 Abrasivekrflow rate


 F 
Mesh #
33
The water pressure will be substitute with kr that is the dimensionless measuring position15 that is the ratio
between the measuring position from the top of the specimen, divided the maxim possible thickness of the work-
piece. In this way kr will not depend on the dimension of our sheet
kmeas
kr= kmax
4.4 Cutting depth model


 Water pressure
Feed rate
kmax = f  
 Abrasive flow rate 
Mesh #
15
The surface roughness Ra will increase as we move downward
34
5 Economical aspects
In order to build a cost model we are only restricting our focus of attention only to the variables cost items directly
related to the choice of processing parameters. So the fix costs are not take in account. The cost function that we
will analyze is :
euro1
C = CA + CW + CE + CU
mm
• C : machining cost
• CA : abrasive consumption cost16
• CW : water treatment and consumption cost17

• CE : energy cost
• CU : orifice and focusing nozzle costs

The purposes are:
• Getting a high quality cut, considering all roughness and taper constraints
• Minimum total cost of production or productivity

• Possibility to use some of the models according to the constraints (depth, roughness, kerf taper)
• Integration of CAM models to allow the end-users to simply select the expected quality, leaving the selection
of the parameters to the system.
5.1 Abrasive consumption cost

Abrasive consumption cost depends on
g 1
ṁ a abrasive flow rate
min
mm 1
v Cutting head speed
min
euro
ca Abrasive cost
kg
cla = ca Abrasive cost euro .

1000 g
So we can see that
ṁa
CA = c euro 1
a
v mm
5.2 Water consumption cost

Water consumption depends on water flow rate and water cost
\
( 2 2 · P · 106 √ m3
Qw = 60 · 0.65 · π dn · 10−6 · ρ0 = q w · P
4 min
( 2 \ 2 10 6
dn ·
where qw = 60 · 0.65 10−6
·π · ·
4 euro ρ0
Considering cw the cost of water in we can write that
m3
16it is very trivial to calculate because we know the price at which we are buying it
17
it’s more tricky to calculate because you have to consider not only the cost of the water but the cost of the machine and translate
it to a variable cost
35
√ euro 1
CW = Qw · cW = qw · P · cw min
mm 1
We consider v as the cutting head speed in and then:
min
Qw · c w
CW = = c ·q √ √ euro 1
· P = cl · P
w w w
v v v mm
5.3 Energy cost

euro 1
The cost of energy is CE = C 1000 · Q w · P where C is the energy cost , and η is the intensifier
e · e
60 · 60 · v · ηint √ kWh int
efficiency. We can write the cost for energy knowing that Qw = qw · P with some mathematical calculation we
have that
√
1000 · Qw · P 1000 · qw · P · P √ euro 1
CE = C e· = Ce · = cle· P 3
60 · 60 · v · ηint 60 · 60 · v · ηint v mm
where ce = Ce · 60·60·ηint
l 1000·q w
5.4 Orifice and focusing nozzle costs

The wear cost CU can be written:
( \
1 Cm Cn clu
CU = · + =
60 · v tm Ln v
( \
1 Cm Cn
where clu = · + ;
60 tm Ln
euro
Cm Focuser cost
piece
euro
Cn Orifice cost
piece
tm Average life of focuser [hours ]
Ln Average life orefice [hours]
6 Application
Water jet is a versatile technology that can be used in different fields. Let’s describe some application for Pure
Water Jet (PWJ) and for Abrasive Water Jet (AWJ)
Pure Water Jet application

• Dismounting a weapon
• Cutting food
• Cutting leather and wood
• Cleaning
• Water jet forming: water jet is used with big sheets of metal. The metal sheet in contact with the pressure
generated by the jet will impose a plastic deformation of the material only on one layer. This is used to bend
really big sheets with a large radius in Aerospace field.
36
Abrasive Water Jet application
• Cutting glass
• Cutting Stones and marble

• Layered materials composed of different sheets stacked one above each other
• Dismounting a weapon
• In the medical field it is used to for the internal and external diameters of hypodermic needles
• Drilling
37
Part II
Hydroforming
Hydroforming is a metal forming process which allows the shaping of metals such as steel, stainless steel, copper
and aluminum. This process is a specialized type of die molding that utilizes highly pressured fluid to form metal.
There are two main types of hydroforming:
• Tube Hydroforming: Tube hydroforming is the expansion of metal tubes into a shape using two dies (upper
die and lower die).
• Sheet Hydroforming: it uses one die and a sheet of metal; the blank sheet is driven into the die by high
pressure water on one side of the sheet forming the desired shape.
Hydroforming is used in order to replace the old process of stamping two parts and then welding them together,
allowing to create even complex shapes; compared to traditional stamped and welded parts, hydroformed parts are
lightweight, and they have higher strength and high-quality surfaces.
7 Tube Hydroforming (THF)

The high pressure is provided by a press (that is the machine), using two dies (upper die and lower die) to
shape the tube for example (Figure 7.1).
Figure 7.1: Press machine.
Round tubes are cheap, as they’re widespread: so hydroforming round tubes is cheaper than order a tube in its
final shape (for example elliptical tube).
7.1 Process sequence
38
Bending parameters
There are two main parameters that describe the facility in bending a tube:
1. Wall factor:
Dout Outer diameter
=
t0 Initial thickness
represents the difficulty in bending: the larger the diameter, the smaller the thickness, the more difficult
will be bending (it will collapse, from circular to oval).
2. The risk of fracture:
Dout Outer diameter
=
RB Mean bending radius
the higher the value, the higher possibility of fractures.
Considering both of them is possible to identify two “regions”:
Figure 7.2: Facility in bending.

Let’s now consider the sequences of generic THF:
1. Usually tubes are pre-bended.
2. Annealing: in order to increase the ductility.
3. The pre-bended tube is put between the two dies, and two sealing rods are put at the two sides to prevent
leaking:
Figure 7.3: Tube insertion.
4. High pressure water is injected in the tube:
39
Figure 7.4: Water injection.
5. The two sealing rods push the tube:
Figure 7.5: Tube is pushed.
6. The tube’s shape changes due to the high pressure of the water:
Figure 7.6: Hydroforming.
7. Calibration (optional): is eventually used to reach the border radius of the die cavity:
Figure 7.7: Calibration.
8. The hydroformed tube is removed:
40
Figure 7.8: Removing.
9. Usually tube’s tips are trimmed, as they take damage when pressed by pistons.
7.2 Process mechanics

7.2.1 Stresses and strains
There are three principal directions of stresses:
Figure 7.9: Stresses and strains in the tube.
1. σ1 the circumferential direction;
2. σ2 the axial direction;
3. σ3 the normal direction.
the directions of the strains are the same as the ones for the stresses.
7.2.2 State of stress

The stress ratio α is defined as:
σ2
α=
σ1
the effective stress (under the assumption of plane stress, as σ3 ≤ 0 at the beginning, if σ3 0 it is very
small.) results:
/
σ = σ 1 1 − α + α2
41
The state of stress and the state of strain are different depending on the region of the tube:
Figure 7.10: State of stress/strain in the tube.
There are two main regions (forgetting about transition zone):
• Guided zone:
– σ1 ≈ 0 because there’s no expansion.

– σ2 < 0 compressive.
– σ3 < 0 compressive, here the assumption of plane strain is not valid.
• Expansion zone:
– σ1 > 0 tensile, because the tube is expanding its circumference.

– σ2 :
∗ σ2 < 0 at the beginning, as the compression of the tube begins.
∗ σ2 = 0 when the tube starts bending on the upper part (like the situation represented i Figure 7.10).
∗ σ2 > 0 in the final part (always considering the tube i Figure 7.10):
– σ3 ≈0 as the upper part of the tube is in contact with air, ⇒there’s no opposition from the external
boundary of the tube; while when the tube touches again the upper die, σ3 < 0 becomes compressive (as
it’s shown in Figure 7.11).
Figure 7.11: Compressive σ3.
7.2.3 State of strain

• Hoop strain ε1 is always positive.
• Axial strain ε2 can be positive (expansion) or negative (guiding).
42
• Thickness strain ε3 is generally negative, but it can be positive in the guided zone.
Thinning of the tube

As the strains along the tube are different: with Hydroforming technology it’s impossible to obtain a tube with a
constant thickness.
Where the tube is thicker, it’s not weaker: on the contrary it is stronger, unless it’s approaching neckinga condition
a
Strizione.
7.3 Parameters: loading curves

Let’s consider the hydroforming process for a t-tube:
Figure 7.12: T-tube sequences.
• Pressure
• Axial feed, depending on the equipment can be controlled by:
– Force.
– Displacement (easier to design): in Figure 7.12 we can see that there’s a counter piston, it requires a
displacement control too.
• Closing force of the press.
All these parameters aren’t really “parameters” as they’re not constant, they are loading curves.
43
Figure 7.13: Loading curves.
Remark 1. The red line represents the piston’s stroke (the displacement), as we can see the slope changes, as there’s
no reason to have a constant velocity of the piston, it can vary.
Remark 2. Piston’s stroke stops in calibration zone, as calibration means that the die cavity is almost completely
filled.
7.3.1 Pressure
Figure 7.14: Pressure’s trend.
• Bulging pressure is the pressure at which the tube’s deformation becomes plastic (it goes out of the elastic
field): the real hydroforming process starts.
• Calibration pressure: higher pressure value than the pressure reached at the end of the forming, in order
to:
– form the tube completely into the die (even small border radius);
– prevent spring-back.
44
Strain Hardening
In the plastic region of a perfect plastic material ((a) i Figure 7.15) if one want to increase the strain, the stress
required is always the same (it remains constant).
Considering a generic material, after its elastic region, the strain can increase only if the stress do it too ((b) i
Figure 7.15).
Figure 7.15: Perfect plastic material (a); hardening behavior (b).

The trend of pressure is represented by the blue curve in the chart of Figure 7.13; one can distinguish three
main zones:
1. Filling: the pressure increases due to the filling of the tube by water.
2. Forming: after bulging pressure, the pressure has to be increased because of strain hardening of the material.
3. Calibrating: the pressure increases a little bit more in order to fill up every small corner of the die cavity.
7.3.2 Bulging Pressure

Let’s consider a small portion of a tube, the state of stress is well represented in Figure 7.1618:
Figure 7.16: State of stress.
the stress matrix results:
σx τxy τxz
 
σ= τyx σy τyz
 τzx τzy σz 
as the element is in a state of balance, this matrix results symmetric.
The state of stress could be represented with another reference system, but this can’t modify stresses and strains,
this means that the previous stress matrix and the new one (in the new reference system) are similar to each other;
among the invariants19 of similar matrices there’s the trace:
I1 = Tr (σ) = σx + σy + σz
this number has to be constant whatever the reference system.

18τ
zx is the tangential stress perpendicular to zx plane.
19
If two matrices are similar they have the same rank, trace and determinant (that’s why these are called invariants.
45
Among the infinite numbers of reference systems, there will be one having this representative matrix:

σx 0 0 σ1 0 0
 
σ= 0 σy 0  = 0 σ2 0  σ 1 > σ 2 > σ3
 0 0 σz  0 0 σ3
the one with principal directions; using this reference system, the state of stress is completely described by three
numbers: σx, σy , σz .
In the case of bulging pressure: σ3 ≈ 0, considering the ratio:
σ2
α=
σ1
it results:
σ1 0 0
 
σ= 0 ασ1 0
 0 0 0 
Making the assumption of an ductile isotropic material, it’s possible to use the Von Mises formula to calculate
the yielding stress value20:
I /
1 2 2 2
σ= √ (σ1 − σ2 ) + (σ1 − σ3 ) + (σ2 − σ3 ) = σ1 1 − α + α 2
2
In order to identify the pressure that allows yielding starting, another equation is required, let’s consider the
lower part of Figure 7.9:
Pi σ1 σ2
= + ✁✁
t0 ρ1 ✁ρ2
(where Pi represents the internal pressure) as the radius ρ2 → ∞ at the beginning (the tube is straight), while ρ1
is equal to:
Dout − t0
ρ1 =
2
putting everything together we obtain:
/ Pi ρ 1 /
σ = σ (P i, α) = σ 1 1 − α + α2 = 1 − α + α2
t0
20As we’re looking for the initial pressure required to start a plastic deformation.
46
Tensile test
Figure 7.17: Tensile test.
The Tensile Test is used to determine the stress flow of a material along one particular direction, assuming for
example “direction 1”, the stress matrix results:
 
o1 0 0
σ = 0 0 0 
0 0 0
in tube hydroforming one can then determine the stress that can provide plastic deformation:
σ1 > σyield
In addition to the stress tensor another one can be considered: the strain tensor, which can be represented with
principal directions too:

ε1 0 0

ε= 0 ε2 0 
 0 0 ε3
making the following assumption:
ε2 = 0
it can be proved that in this case α = 0.5, as at the beginning of the process there’s a condition of plane
strain(ε2 = 0):
1
α=
2
⇒ 4 σt 0 σ1t 0
=2
Pi = √ − t 0 ) (D out − t 0)
3 (D
out
where σ is usually known by the tensile test.

Remark 3. The previous formula can be used only at the beginning of the process and with simple geometries.
Generally a strain can be considered zero along a certain direction:
• when the material is totally constrain along that direction;
• when the material is very long along that direction (this is the case of the tube).
47
7.3.3 Calibration pressure
At the end of the process (calibration zone), the pressure depends even on the small radii of the die cavity: the
smaller the radius, the higher the pressure; ρ2 → ∞ because at the end the curvature is infinity along that direction
(straight tube), so once again:
Pf σ σ
= 1 + ✁2
ti ρ1 ✁ρ2
where Pf is the pressure’s value at the end of the process, ad ti is the instantaneous value of thickness (at
the end) which is unknown; the flow stress σ is unknown too, the only thing we know is it will be lower than the
ultimate tensile stress, otherwise fracture would occur.
Assumption of plane stress (σ3 = 0 ) in calibration

Let’s consider the ultimate part of the process, when calibration starts, in the region where the tube is in contact
with the die σ3 has almost the same value of the internal pressure Pi (Figure 7.18).
Figure 7.18: σ3 trend on the part in contact with the die.
While considering calibration pressure, σ3 has a strong gradient (Figure 7.19), it goes from zero (outer part, where
the tube is in contact with air) up to 200/2000MPa (inner part, with internal pressure), so there’s a triangular
stress distribution that’s why σ3 ≈0 is a strong assumption that leads to an great error, making the formula
obtained for bulging pressure weak: it’s possible to use the previous formula anyway (assuming a certain thickness)
and of course if the results make no sense a FEM simulation is suggested.
Figure 7.19: σ3 trend in calibration.

The only why to know these values is by FEM; finally calibration pressure depends on:
Pcalibration = Pcalibration (Rmin, σ, t)
7.3.4 Die closing force
Figure 7.20: Die closing force.
Projection of the crossing section Ap on the separation plane on the die is equal to:
48
Ap = L f Dout
where Dout is the outer diameter of the tube and Lf is the final length of the tube; multiplying it by the pressure
we can find the force that has to be applied to the dies in order to keep the press closed:
Fc = Pi,maxAp
Remark 4. The force required can even exceeds then thousand tons.
7.4 Defects
Let’s consider some geometrical quantities:
• Li : initial length of the tube;
• Lf : final length of the tube;
• Dout : outer diameter of the tube;
• t0 : initial thickness of the tube.
We’ve already seen one kind of defect: not uniform thickness of the final tube, this is inevitable; on the other hand
there are some defects which depend on an incorrect selection of process parameters:
Figure 7.21: Defects of Hydroforming.
1. Buckling: due to an excess of axial compression, with very low normal stress; it usually occurs when the
tube is very long.
2. Wrinkling: due to an excess of axial compression, with some normal stress; it’s similar to buckling, the only
difference is the wave length.
3. Bursting: due to an excess of hoop tension with some axial tension too, it leads to fractures
Name Due to Geometrical condition

Buckling Axial compression Li » Dout
Wrinkling Axial compression Li « Dout
Bursting Hoop tension
Taking in account defects related to axial compression and hoop tension, it’s possible to define a feasibility
zone for the process, as it follows in the Figure 7.22:
49
Figure 7.22: Feasibility of Hydroforming.
as we can see if the internal pressure and the axial force are both low, plastic deformation can’t start; leakages
occur when pressure reaches high levels, and the axial force is small. Low internal pressure and high axial
force lead to wrinkling (high axial compression); while high internal pressure and high axial force lead to
bursting.
4. Pinching: the tube is entrapped between the two dies (usually if the initial tube is too large).
Figure 7.23: Pinching.
5. Insufficient calibration
6. Closing force: because the higher the pressure, the higher will be the cost of the press that can achieve that
value ⇒ economical problem.
7.5 Applications
Hydroforming is mainly applied in automotive field:
• Piping:
– Materials: usually stainless steel, but also aluminum for air-pipes.
– Examples: exhaust pipes, engine tubes, catalytic converters, pressure tubes, tail pipes, connectors and
manifolds.
• Structural parts:
– Materials: low to medium carbon steels and aluminum for structural and cost related reasons.
– Examples:
∗ chassis and body: ladder frames, hitch bars, side roof rails and roof bows, radiator frames;
∗ steering and suspension: control arms, trailing links, steering columns;
∗ safety parts: roll-over bars, seat frames and shock absorber housings, bumper beams.
• Engine and drive cases:
50
– Materials: case hardening steel.
– Example: hollow camshafts, drive shafts and gear shafts.
Figure 7.24: Some examples.
• Bicycle frames.
• Home design: handles, tea boilers, as this technology gives freedom in designing cross sections.
7.6 Economical aspects

The process is very slow, so for building one part (if it’s large) it might take up to 40s, then is not possible to use
hydroforming for mass production21; this technology becomes convenient for example considering production per
year equal to 1000 units.
Component Part/Stroke Cycle Time
Exhaust manifolds 2÷ 4 15 ÷ 20s
Side-rail for pickup truck 2 40s
Instrumental panel beam 1 35s
T shapes up to 25 13s
Figure 7.25: Cost contributions.
7.7 Design guidelines

All THF processes can be divided in four family (A, B, C, D) , which can be classified by geometrical features or
process design variables:
21
This is true for all not conventional technologies, which are dedicated to custom production.
51
Group A Group B Group C Group D
long parts with no bulges parts wiht no bulges,
parts with
General description or protusions protrusions nor bulged parts
protrusions
and with sharp bends sharp bends
Table 1: Groups description.
Geometrical features Group A Group B Group C Group D

n° of sharp bends >2 ≤2 0 0
n° of protrusions 0 0 0 ≤2
n° of bulges 0 0 >0 ≤1
Lf
Spline length usually > 20 usually > 15 ':: 10 <5
Dout
Table 2: Geometrical features classification.
Process design variables Group A Group B Group C Group D

Crushing yes optional no no
d no feed small feed average feed large feed
Amount of axial feed ax
Li 0 ':: 0.05 ':: 0.2 ':: 0.4
Table 3: Process design variables classification.
In order to design a hydroforming machine it’s important to know how great the stroke of the piston is, unfor-
tunately there’s no formula but there are some criteria: for example if one know the outer surface of the final part
the volume of the metal of the tube is equal to:
t0 Sf = πDout Li/
/ t0
where Sf is the final outer surface and Li the initial length of the tube, assuming a constant thickness is a strong
assumption, anyway this calculation is just aimed at having a order of magnitude of Li .
As Table 3 shows, usually axial feed is needed by parts with protrusions (like the T-tube):
Figure 7.26: Axial feed in a T-tube THF.
Figure 7.27: Families of THF.
So by the end:
• Group A :
– Very long tubes with little expansion.
• Group B :
52
– Limited expansion.
• Group C :
– Typically axis symmetric tube having and radial expansion.
• Group D:
– Usually T-shape tube
53
8 Sheet Hydroforming (SHF)
Sheet Hydroforming is less diffused than Tube Hydroforming, mainly because in this case sealing and die closing
force are greater:
• Higher die closing force.
• Bigger sealing issues ⇒ more leakages.

There are several kinds of SHF, the simplest one is well shown in Figure 8.1:
Figure 8.1: SHF simple scheme.
the sheet is at first clamped between the upper and lower die, the pressurized water is introduced through the
lower one, this configuration is called single effect press: there’s only one thing that is moving (the upper die);
usually this solution prevents leakage using on o-ring coupled with a great pressure applied on the perimeter (blank
holding force22). The blank holding force can’t be too much big: the material is clamped, it can only stretch
(tension), because of that the fracture can occur earlier.
This kind of flow (toward the center) is called draw-in flow; there are typically two solution to this problem,
there are in fact two configuration which can allow the material flow:
1. Flexforming: the fluid plays the role of the punch.

2. Hydromec: the fluid plays the role of the matrix.
8.1 Flexforming
Flexforming eliminates the risk of leakage by using a membrane (rubber diaphragm), which is elastic:
Figure 8.2: Flexforming single effect press.
the membrane (as shown in Figure 8.2) separates the sheet from the pressure fluid (sheet not wet anymore).
The rubber membrane can be easily deformed by the pressurized liquid, because of its high elasticity (Figure
8.3), leakage problem disappears as all the liquid is contained inside the membrane; at the same time the sheet is
free to move (not clamped anymore).
22In italian: premilamiera.
54
Figure 8.3: Flexforming sequence.
The problem of this kind of sheet hydroforming is that there’s not a draw-in flow at all, this can cause wrinkling.
8.2 Hydromech
In Hydromech there’s a punch moving down and blankholder which is independent from the punch, this creates a
double effect stress; this kind of SHF can control the draw-in flow although some leakage still occurs.
Figure 8.4: Hydromech scheme.
In this case controlling the pressure is more difficult, as there has to be a valve in order to let the pressurized
liquid flow away when the punch goes down, as Figure 8.5 shows:
1. At first the metal sheet is clamped;
2. pressure increases;
3. the punch moves down and at the same time a system of valves allow the pressurized liquid to flow away.
Figure 8.5: Hydromech sequences.
In this SHF there’s a risk of presence of bulging at the beginning of the process (Figure 8.6) , it could lead to
fracture due to the probable pinching.
55
Figure 8.6: Bulging in Hydromech.
8.3 Applications
Generally sheet hydroforming is used when one is interested into the quality of the surface; it is mainly used in
aerospace industry: usually in this field there are just few (hundreds) parts per year, allowing saving money for
machining, as in SHF one of the two solid dies is replaced by water, that can both play the role of the punch and
the die.
So the applications in which SHF finds its place are:
• aerospace industry;
• design and prototype industry;

• automotive industry.
8.4 Advantages and disadvantages

SHF has many advantages comparing it to traditional deep drawing process:
• cheaper dies (usually just one die is required);

• better surface quality due to the presence of the fluid;
• more homogeneous thickness and residual strains;
• better dimensional accuracy;
• particular geometries can be obtained, even the ones containing undercuts;

• higher deep drawing ratio:
the deep drawing ratio is defined as the ratio between the initial diameter of the disk23 and the final one24:
D0
β=
Df
This ratio is an indicator of the difficulty of the process, with the traditional deep drawing technology it is
possible to reach value of β equal to maximum 2: that means that if β≤ 2 the object can be obtained in just
one time (otherwise the process has to proceed through multiple steps); while with SHF the value of β can
increase even up to 2.8/3.
23In case of cylindrical deep drawing.
24More or less equal to the diameter of the punch.
56
Figure 8.7: Deep drawing ratio.
The main disadvantages of the process are:

• high cost of the system (press, intensifier and hydraulic system): this high cost is mainly due to the great
forces required to seal the system, preventing leakage.
• low velocity of the process.
8.5 Pressure in SHF

8.5.1 Pressure and internal radii
As in THF, corner radii are still an issue in SHF: the press limits the pressure and pressure limits corner radii
obtainable, generally higher pressure is required for:
• higher thickness;
• small radii (of convex parts, Figure 8.8).
Figure 8.8: Pressure and internal radius.
usually there’s a part of the press called intensifier, that allow to further increase the pressure during the
calibration.
8.5.2 Pressure and blankholding force

As it has be done with THF, it is possible to define a feasibility chart, which has the pressure on the x axis and
blank holder pressure on y axis (instead of the axial feed):
57
Figure 8.9: Pressure and blankholding force, feasibility diagram.
Remark 5. Apparently from the diagram represented in Figure 8.9 there’s not risk of wrinkling25, but we got to
keep in mind that these kinds of charts are made for specific part, they are not general diagrams.
25It would appear on the left part of the diagram.
58
9 Hydroforming machines
Differently from traditional forming processes, the presses used in hydroforming process has two main aims:
1. The primary function is to maintain closed the two sections opposing to the internal pressure tending to
separate them.
2. On the other hand they have to be easily openable in order to reduce the time needed to take the worked
piece and start again with a new one.
Usually hydraulic presses are used, generally they are vertical presses, in which the upper part moves down toward
the lower one (usually fixed).
There are single effect presses and double effect presses (Figure 9.1) :
• Single effect press → it uses just one axis of movement for opening, closing and to apply the force required.
• Double effect press → it has an additional actuator working in the same direction, like a separate axis: the
first axis is used to apply the force to the workpiece, the second one could be used for instance for stamping.
Figure 9.1: Single and double effect presses.
Usually the presses have the following properties:
• proper die closing force;

• proper dimension, in order to contain the piece;
• automatic mobile axis of piston;

• high pressure reachable (200 ÷ 500MPa)
Almost all the presses have some intensifier that allow to reach high levels of pressure, usually during the calibration
phase, to further increase the pressure (actual presses can provide forces up to 100MN ).
59
Part III
Ultrasonic machining process
10 USM
The ultrasonic machining is an unconventional kind of machining process realized by vibrations. These are generated
by the combination of an oscillator and a transducer, then they are trasmitted to the workpiece through a tool tip
in order to create shockwaves that propagate throughout the material causing fractures.
The typical worked materials are brittle materials because the mechanism of fracture naturally occurs
whereas if the material is ductile this mechanism becomes really difficult due to the capability of ductile material
to absorb a big amount of energy during an impact. The tool tip vibrates vertically with a very fast oscillation rate
so that the common frequencies exceeds 20kHZ and the amplitude goes from 15 to 50 microns: so, actually, the
tool tip hits the material through an intermediate medium (layer of water and suspended abrasive grains) and not
directly. That is a big difference in respect to the conventional machining processes, where the contact between the
tool and the workpiece is the main interaction.
This process can be used in different ways like machining and welding applications but can also be used in
cleaning and inspection applications.
First of all, the electric current feeds an electronic oscillator that that transform the low frequency signal
into an high frequency signal. Then, using a transducer, the current is converted into longitudinal mechanical
vibrations typical with the same frequencies but not necessarily. These mechanical vibrations are transmitted to
the tool through a a cone concentrator, called horn or sonotrode, which has the task to magnify the amplitude
of vibrations: the idea is to place this component at resonant positions so that the dynamic amplification is higher.
Amplifying the amplitude of vibrations is necessary because, as it will be explained after, the larger is the amplitude
the higher is the material removal rate.
Figure 10.1: The transducer, the tool and the horn, abrasive feeding
10.1 The material removal mechanism

As it is possible to see in the following image, the slurry, that is made of water and suspended abrasive particles
like carbides or oxides, flows through the smallest gaps between the two interfaces. The removal is due to several
mechanism:
• continuous localized hammering is the main interaction effect between the tool and the workpiece: the tool
plays the role of an “hammer” hitting the abrasive particles that cause fractures on the workpiece.
• free impact: it happens when the bottom of the tool hits abrasive particles but the gap between the tool and
the workpiece is larger than the size of the particles so that the grains are thrown directly to the material
causing fracture and transmission of energy.
• sliding erosion: it happens frequently on the vertical sides when the particles act with an abrasive action that
is completely different from the action at the bottom (hammering and free impact) causing a difference in the
surface roughness.
• cavitation and chemical erosion: it’s not so frequently but however it is present. Chemical reactions may
occur due to the particular selection of materials but also cavitation is a risk and it is due to the localized
depressure caused by the back movements of the bottom of the tool.
60
Figure 10.2: MRR mechanism
10.2 The piezoelectric transducer

The piezoelectric transducer, through the piezoelectric effect, is able to convert a current into mechanical strain
but they show also the inverse process, so they generate an internal electrical charge resulting from an applied
mechanical force. It is typically made of natural crystals and synthetic ceramics. In the following images, on the
right we can see the transducers connected to an aluminum coupling mass through a screw, necessary in order to
create continuity and transmit the vibrations to the sonotrode. While on the left it is showed a chart of stress
generated by the vibrations and the amplitudes. It’s important to underscore the presence of stationary points,
where the amplitude of vibrations is equal to zero, named nodes, whereas points, named loops, where the amplitudes
is very high. As it is said before, the idea is to place the horn somewhere in this point so that the amplification is
higher. But there’s a problem related to the nodes: in fact, where the amplitude is zero the stress is maximum and
so these regions may show fatigue problems during their life.
Figure 10.3: (Left) detail of the transducer; (Right) behaviour of stress and amplitude in a real tool
Advantages:
• these kind of transducers are very small,
• low power and high frequency.
• efficient
Disadvantages:
• if compared to the magnetostrictive transducers, they have a limited duration due to histeresis problem.
10.3 The magnetostrictive transducer

This kind of transducer, that is less common than the previous one, is used in the more powerful application.
It works through the conversation of magnetic energy into mechanical energy (Joule effect) and compared to the
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piezoelectric transducer, is quite heavy because it contains a ferromagnetic core. But the working principle remains
the same: the aim is to place the sonotrode in the loops so that the amplification of vibrations is maximum.
Figure 10.4: (Left) behavior of stress and amplitude in a real tool; (Right) The nucleus and the windings in the
magnetostrictive transducer
As it is possible to see in the picture on the right, it is made by a nucleus (N) formed by a packing of metal
layers and by a winding crossed by alternating current. The different layers must be ferromagnetic materials,
typical ferrous alloys plus some components. They are classified in different ways for example the K coefficient,
that expresses the square root of the ratio between the electromagnetic energy provided and the mechanical energy
obtained, or the coefficient of elongation. Depending on the elements in these alloys, we may have components with
much elongation (for example the ones that contain nickel or aluminum), but remember that the coefficient K is
always lower than 1 due to the losses in this mechanism.
Next to the transducers there are two nucleus with other winding, crossed by current that polarize the main
magnetic field H allowing sinusoidal displacements of greater amplitude. Looking at the next images, it is possible
to see that varying the magnetic field H from negative values to positive values, but lower than the saturation level,
we obtain an elongation that is a characteristic for that transducer. Depending on the magnetic field H imposed, we
obtain different elongation. In these images there is also a comparison between two different cases: the one on the
left used to obtain a output signal with a frequency that is doubled in respect to the frequency of the magnetic field
in input, and the one on the right in which the output signal has the same frequency of H. The second case happens
because we are using a variable and positive magnetic field (so the transducer is always elongated). Remember also
that the modulation of H regulates the amplitude of mechanical vibration in output and the modulation of H is
possible only varying the current that crosses the windings.
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Figure 10.5: The relationship between the elongation and the magnetic field. The first case shows ho to have an
output signal with a double frequency in respect to the input signal, while the second shows that the signal in input
and in output have the same frquency.
Briefly, in the following table we can resume the main differences between the two transducers:
Figure 10.6: Summary of the main differences between the two transducers.
10.4 The sonotrode

This part is really important. The concentrator (or horn or sonotrode) may have different shapes depending
on the applications. By modifying its shape and length, the amplitude of vibrations change, but there is always
a limit. The idea with that component, is to reduce its cross section with the length so that the elastic waves,
that propagate through the material, increase their amplitude. So it’s simple to predict the possible shape of this
component as we see in the following pictures. The most simple shape is the linear type or the exponential
type. With these profiles it is possible to demonstrate that the amplification factor is proportional to the ratio
between the initial and the final diameters. There is also the third case, the stepped type, which is apparently
better than the previous ones because the amplification factor is proportional to the square of the ratio between
the two diameters. The main problem of that solution is a concentration of stress in the region of drastic change of
diameter. Also the first two types suffers from fatigue problem if we reduce too much the cross section.
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Figure 10.7: The first picture shows the 3 typical shapes of the sonotrode: linear, exponential and stepped. Then
for each shape it is clarified approximately the diagram of stress and amplitude in the second image.
In the second image it is possible to see the function of stress with the length of the sonotrode, showing that the
third type suffer too much, especially in the region of the sudden change of the diameter. Another detail is that
the second solution may be used in micro processing due to the very small end of the part. However the stepped
type is the one that can reach amplification factors up to 16.
Talking about the mechanical properties of the sonotrode, and also the workpiece, there are at least 3 mechan-
ical properties that delineate the borders of this process: the stiffness, the brittleness/ductility and the
strength. The sonotrode, in fact, must be stiffer (higher slope in the diagram sigma eps) if possible and ductile
due to the interaction process (hammering and free impact), so that it hardly deteriorate, but also harder than the
workpiece. On the counterside the workpiece must be, ideally, soft and brittle but it’s impossible because if it’s soft,
it is also ductile and so it is hardly to machine. In order to obtain a good value o MRR and so, in order to improve
and make possible the process, the best conditions are HARD and DUCTILE for the tool, and SOFT but
BRITTLE for the workpiece.
10.5 Process parameters and MRR

The material removal rate strictly depends on mechanical properties of the tool and the workpiece. In general we
can say that it is proportional to the volume (V ) of removed material by a single particle, to the number (Z ) of
impacting particles per cycle, and the frequency (f ).
The solution is an empirical formula reported here.
3 3 1
d ·F 4 · A 4 · C 4
MRR"" 3 3
·f
w
H 4 · (1 + λ) 4
Note the dependence from the size of the particle (d), the average indentation force (F ), that is a compression
static force, the oscillation amplitude (A), the concentration of abrasive in the water (C ), the frequency(f ), and
with the inverse of workpiece Brinell hardness (H ), but also from the workpiece indentation ratio (λ). This last one
is the ratio between how much a particle penetrates into the tool (Ht) and how much the particle penetrates into
the workpiece (Hw), that is equal to the ratio between the stress induced into the workpiece and the stress induced
into the tool. Remember that the lower is λ the higher is the MRR, so it’s better having ductile tool and brittle
material.
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Figure 10.8: Detail of the hammering impact mechanism and the effect of a abrasive grain squeezed: in particular
note the penetration of a grain in the bottom of the tool and in the workpiece.
Note that there are some details that must be taken into account at least from a theoretical point of view. First
of all the dimension of the grain ,which is not perfectly spherical but it has a random shape. Then, as we could
see in the MRR-F diagram, due to a saturation effect of the indentation force, the MRR has a maximum point that
shouldn’t be overcome because here the force F is so high that it has the capability to break the abrasive grains
reducing the MRR and the efficiency of the process, while just looking at the empirical formula, the higher is F the
higher will be the MRR.
Figure 10.9: (Left)MRR-F chart; (Right) comparison between the shape of an ideal grain and a real grain
Now let’s see the following diagrams.They clarify the dependence between MRR and some factors like the
amplitude A or the frequency. In particular note that the higher is A the more the curve of the MRR function of F
slides upper, deducing that we can achieve higher MRR, giving the same average indentation force. Note also the
dependence on the frequency, which has the same effect said before.
Figure 10.10: Different curves rapresenting the influence of different parameters in the material removal rate.
Remember that the model cannot predict correctly whatever tool-material pair since it just takes into account
the relative hardness without depending on the ductile/fragile behavior of the materials which is a key parameter,
in fact the model does not take into account the fragile fracture mechanisms but only the indentation phenomena.
In order to underscore another time this fact, just look at the following chart that explains how the tool wear must
be made of if we want to improve machinability. As we can see in the following picture we can compare different
materials with some material taken as a reference. For example taking into account the glass (100% percentage for
machining rate) as a material reference ( note the relative wear equal to 1), when another material is worked, for
instance the ruby, the x coordinate indicates the maching rate in percentage at which it is typically worked while
the y coordinate represents a typical reference for the tool wear for that material and so on. Taking as reference
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the chrome steel, that is ductile whereas the glass is brittle, we can make comparisons between different material
and chrome steel because it is taken as the reference.
Figure 10.11: Comparison between different kind of worked material
The tool wear may be classified into different ways, for example the longitudinal wear or the lateral wear.
Depending on the value we select we can see in the chart below the dependence between the MRR and the tool
wear but also between the cutting time and the tool wear showing that the higher is the tool wear the higher will
be the MRR, so it’s better to guarantee that the ductile wear is as much as possible.
Figure 10.12: On the top geometrical details of the sonotrode while on the bottom a diagram showing the relationship
between MRR and tool wear and cutting speed with tool wear.
Talking about the abrasive particles, normally the average diameter varies between 5 to 20 µm for finishing
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operations, while between 20 to 150 µm for the heaviest roughing ones. In the following chart it is explained
the relationship between the roughness and the average particle size showing that increasing the mesh number, so
deceasing the size of the particles, the roughness reduces while, on the counter side, it increases if we increase the
size of the particles. Note that, due to the several mechanism of interactions between the tool and the workpiece, we
can’t obtain a unique roughness but there will be different roughness depending on the worked side we are taking
into account: in fact, while on the vertical side the abrasion is the main interaction whereas on the bottom side
the hammering plays the main role. So we expect different curves, one for the bottom and one for the side, as we
see in the chart. On the left we see a table containing different kinds of abrasive with their relative hardness and
cutting power.
Figure 10.13: On the left there is a chart showing the dependence of roughness from average particle size. In
particular note that there are two curves, one for the bottom surface, one for the side surface: as it is explained
before, the surfaces present different roughness due to the different MRR mechanisms. On the right there is a table
that present the most common abrasive particles used in USM with their typical value of hardness and cutting
power.
10.6 Industrial applications

This process is very limited in terms of industrial applications due to the selection of possible materials. Never-
theless It is used specially on ceramics and porcelain applications, diamond cutting for jewelry, optical components
machining such as lenses in glass or quartz, threading of glass and ceramics, machining of any material with a
brittle behavior, grinding, blind holes of different size and sections, scribing and punching of molds, even in steel,
semiconductors materials machining and other.
As it was said before, this process has a lot of problem concerning specially the materials that can be worked,
the MRR that may be very small in certain applications (like deep penetration), the efficiency of the process and
related to also the cost itself, but also the significant tool wear that make more difficult to reach specific tolerances
or roughness, in fact, the abrasive flow does not machine only the workpiece but it also wears out the tool during
its washing effect, so actually, it’s harder to respect the required dimensional tolerances.
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11 Rotary ultrasonic machining
The problems of USM can be solved, or at least mitigated, with a variant of the process called Rotary Ultrasonic
Machining. It is able to combine the longitudinal tool vibration with a rotary movement of the spindle of the
tool. With this little variation, the cutting mechanism now changes significantly: by fixing the abrasive particles
on the surface of the tool, which can rotate, the interaction now is basically made of abrasive action on both the
sides (bottom and verrtical) reducing the low impact force and the hammering effect, and deleting the cavitation
or chemical action. The slurry is not needed anymore, but water is needed to cool down the workpiece due the
working temperature that can be reached. In the following pictures we can see how the process and the material
removal mechanism work
Figure 11.1: On the left it is shown a detail of the tool and the material removal mechanism while on the right
there’s a real machine used in rotary USM.
This technology is able to machine effectively only non-metallic materials in drilling, milling or grinding opera-
tions. The effectiveness in machining only non metallic materials is due to the design of the tool: the simultaneous
action of sonotrode vibration and abrasive flow (USM) is substituted only by the sonotrode action where diamond
grains stick permanently to its working surface.
Given that the abrasive is not renewed, it is usually used diamond as abrasive particles, due to its performances
in cutting and hardness, but also because of the tool life. As in USM, the tool base metal must be ductile and later
covered with diamond powder.
This process is usually used to design and create small features and geometrical details so, actually, the tool
may be very small. Given that the cutting speed is proportional to the diameter and since the diameter reduces,
the rotation of the spindle may become very high (the range of variation is from 3000 to 60000 rpm).The typical
machinable materials are alumina, zirconium, glass,quartz, carbon fiber, tungsten carbide, silicon and other.
This process, in addition to solve the USM problems, can achieve higher tolerances and better surface roughnesses
and it gives more freedom in geometry to be realized.
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12 Ultrasonic welding
The idea of using ultrasonic vibrations is not applied just in the machining field but also in the welding processes:
it is usually called ultrasonic welding. As in the USM, in this process we still have the horn and the transducer
but the vibrations now are mostly on the horizontal side and the situation is completely different: now we have
two sheets we want to join up (lap joint) togheter in order to create continuity between the two pieces. As it is
possible to see in the image below, the bottom sheet is fixed to an avil, which is also fixed to the ground,while the
upper sheet is in contact and connected properly to the sonotrode, which transmit the vibrations. It’s absolutely
important to guarantee that the bottom sheet remains there and fixed because if not it would move during the
process making the welding difficult and we cannot improve the friction amid the two sheets. So, actually, the
anvil and the sonotrode surfaces are characterized by a particoular shape (pyramidal matrix for instance) which
increases the friction at the contact with the sheets. The static force makes this process similar to the cold pressure
welding, while the presence of ultrasonic vibrations creates friction between the welded sheets making it similar to
the friction welding. Results will be a combination of this two technologies.
Figure 12.1: Schematic example of the welding process: on the left are shown the
Remember that in the traditional welding process, the temperature increases at the contact zone so that a
tiny layer of the two materials melts but now, due to vibrations, we still increase the temperature but not up to
the melting temperature: it is a cold welding and it is possible through a chemical mechanism called diffusion
bonding.
This mechanism happens when atoms of two different sheets can move due to the temperature that increases
significantly at the interface (30%-40% of the melting temperature), so they can migrate into the other side if there
is sufficient contact between the two sheets. We don’t have just diffusion bonding but also plastic deformation
because we squeeze the material a lot so the surface roughness will meet each other. But just plastic deformation is
not sufficient because it will create a weak bond: in order to have a strong bond we need plastic deformation, that
happens specially at the beginning of the process (some seconds depending on the material) and diffusion bonding
which last the rest of the time because we to allow atoms to migrate due to the temperature.
During this process, there may be a obstacle represented by the formation of an oxide layer between the two
sheets due to the temperature. Obviously we need to break oxide which is very easy actually because oxydes are
brittle. The problem related to the oxides is that when they are broken they will be present then in the two sheets.
The following images show the layers of oxides before the process. But there are also two layers (black layers)
which are represented mainly by dust, grease, powder, oil or everything that may make dirty the surfaces. They
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must be removed too and it is possible by cleaning the surfaces but not too much because by cleaning perfectly the
two surfaces we reduce the friction and so the efficiency of the process. But as it is possible to see in the second
picture the two sheets then are perfectly connected without relevant defects. In fact this kind of welding is able to
guarantee higher mechanical properties than other welding techniques.
Figure 12.2: Before and after ultrasonic welding. It’s important to underscore the presence of oxydes and the black
layer (dust, powder, grease) in the left image.
It is possible to join up different materials but not all the combinations are possible. Here is reported a table
of some possible combinations for the typical materials. USW is used typically in electrical components: copper
alloys welding is the most spread application of this technology. Highly efficient welding can be performed joining
copper alloys also together with other materials such as aluminium.
Figure 12.3: Some possible combination of materials that may be welded. Note that not all the combination are
possible: for example it is possible to weld togheter two sheets of allumina alloys or a sheet made of allumina alloy
and gold. But it’s not possible the combination between copper alloys and silicium.
Here there another image that clarify the importance of cleaning or not the surfaces before the process. Let’s
assume we have 3 kind of surfaces, one is untreated, one degreased and one oil lubricated. The strongest bond will
be obtained with the untreated surfaces although the the standard deviation of the results. If we clean the surfaces
we get less strength but we can get more repetible results because the surface conditions are more constant. And,
of course, if we use oil lubrication we reduce the coefficient of friction obtaining a weak bond.
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Figure 12.4: Difference between 3 kind of surfaces that are welded. In particoular note the tensile strength and the
standard deviation.
The necessary energy depends on the hardness and the thermo-physical properties of the material to be welded.
Approximately the energy value is equal to the product between the static force and the vibration amplitude.
Alternatively, the following empirical formula can be used:
Figure 12.5: Time of the welding process required for specific levels of used power.
3
W
E = k (to · Hw ) 2
sec
Where Hw is Brinell hardness, t0 the sheet thickness, k is a coefficient depending on the material to be welded.
Once the necessary energy is estimated, some isoenergetic curves can be calculated, in order to relate the total
welding time with the process parameters in order to guarantee the sufficient energy in the welding point.
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Part IV
Cryogenic
Cryogenic consist in cooling down the tool during machining operation due to increase the MRR and the tool life.
This is adopted in particular for titanium alloys that are particularly difficult to machine.
13 Materials
13.1 Ti alloy
As we said, the main application field of the cryogenic is the machining of titanium alloys. There are 5 grades
of this alloy: from grade 1 (pure Ti) to grade 5 that is the most resistant one. The most common grade 5 alloy is
Ti6Al4V26 (more resistant than steel but lighter), that is used in aerospace industry. Another application field of
Ti alloys is the medical one to produce prothesis, in fact this material is biocompatible and inert with the human
body.
13.1.1 Machining problems

Titanium is very difficult to machine due to these main problems:
• low thermal conductivity: heat isn’t removed from the cutting zone (we can reach 700-800 °C) and so special
cooling systems are required. This is the most important problem.
• risk of built-up edge27 due to the high chemical reactivity (diffusion phenomena). Solution: use inserts in
composite ceramics and cryogenic cooling
Figure 13.1: Built-up edge (BUE)
• serrated chip and instability of the cutting force: additional vibrations. Solution: high feed rate
Figure 13.2: Serrated chip formation
• reduced tool-chip contact area due to the tool wear: higher contact pressure. Solution: sharp tool tip radius
• strong elastic spring back (difficult to predict the final shape) and risk of residual stresses. Solution: sharp
tool tip radius
26
Indicative properties: σy = 1200 MP a , ρ = 4500 kg/m3, E = 10, 3 GP a
27
Some chip is added to the tool and this decrease its life and the tolerance of the machining process
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Figure 13.3: Elastic spring back
13.1.2 Residual stress and cutting parameters

As we can see from figure 13.4, a worn tool increases the residual stress on the machined surface. In order to
decrease the wear rate I have to reduce the cutting speed and the feed rate, so we are reducing the MRR. In
practical applications we have that the MRR for Ti-alloy is almost 10 times lower than the one for Al-alloy.
On aerospace industry, due to the low number of component produced, dies are not used (high cost) and the
standard process consist in machining the piece from a full block of material. In general the components produced
are very thin and with a complex shape, so there is a lot of material removed. The buy to fly ratio (BTF) is
the ration between the original material weigh and the one of the final component, in general it is around 8:1. To
increase the productivity of the process is important increase in particular the MRR of the roughing, because it is
the most impacting one on the machining time and cost.
Figure 13.4: Residual stress on Ti-alloy
Roughing Finishing
vc [m/min] 35 - 70 80 - 100
f [mm/rev] 0,2 - 0,4 0,2 - 0,1
b [mm] 1,5 - 2 0,25
Figure 13.5: Typical cutting parameters for Ti-alloy
13.2 INCONEL
Another material machined with cryogenic cooling is this Nickel based alloy, the most common one is Inconel 718.
Inconel is used on aerospace industry for turbines due to its high temperature resistance obtained by precipitation
of interstitial compounds. Note that at high temperature this material is more resistant than titanium alloy.
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Figure 13.6: Yield strength between Inconel and other material
74
14 Tool life model
To determine the tool life we can calculate the cost and the time production as a function of different cutting speed.
For both the time and the cost there is an optimal cutting speed that minimize respectively the time and the cost. If
we cut at a speed lower of this optimal value the time/cost increases due to a low efficiency of the process, otherwise
if we cut too fast the tool wear increases a lot and we spend a lot of time and money in replacing the tool. Using a
strong cooling system, as the cryogenic one, the tool life increases and the curves moves down and right as shown
in figure 14.1.
Figure 14.1: Cost (Cp) and time (tp) optimization in function of the cutting speed
14.1 Cooling technology

The standard cooling technologies use an emulsion of water and oil to remove the heat generated by the cutting
process. The fluid may be supplied by some channel inside the tool or by some nozzle outside it. In any case,
to have an high heat removal rate, the fluid is at high pressure28 (normally 5-10 bar, but up to 70-150 bar for
unconventional cooling strategy) and with a large flow rate. This solution isn’t environmentally friendly because
the chip will be dirt of oil and also the water-oil emulsion needs a specific treatment.
An alternative to these classic technology is the cryogenic cooling with N2 or sometimes with CO2. In particular
the liquid nitrogen (LN2) is inert, non-toxic, it has a very low boiling temperature (-196 °C) and once in the air it
will evaporate leaving the chip and the workpiece clean and dry. So, LN2 has a hight cooling effect and at the same
time has good environmental properties (compared to oil and CO 2), reducing the oil cost for the production. An
alternative to NL2 is CO2, but it has a lower cooling effect (it works at -78,5 °C) and it isn’t so environmentally
friendly as N2.
Figure 14.2: CO2 and N2 phase diagram
In figure 14.2 the CO2 and N2 phase diagrams are shown, in which we can see the following points:
28This is the actual standard for cooling
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• At ambient pressure LN2 is liquid at a temperature between -210 °C and -196 °C. This means that it can be
stored at low pressure (ambient pressure or up to 20 bar) and and once released on the air it will evaporate.
But, due to the low temperature, all the hoses must be very heat insulated and for the storing a special tank
(dewar29) is required.
• At ambient temperature carbon dioxide is liquid only at high pressure. In real application it is stored at high
pressure (80-100 bar) but the tank doesn’t need a thermal insulation.
• When I use the CO2, at the exit of the nozzle, the gas will reach the ambient pressure and so it will be very
close to the triple point. It may happens that some ice crystals will be formed and they block the nozzle. To
avoid this problem the CO2 can be mixed with other gasses.
• LN2 evaporates also if it in not used, instead CO2 do not evaporate
14.2 Tool wear

In figure 14.3 is represented a worn cutting tool with its main wear regions. In general, to set a limit on the
permissible wear, a limit an the Frank wear (VB) parameter is set. After making some experiments, we can obtain
a graph, as the one in figure 14.4, in which we can set the wear limit. Note that wear depends also on the cutting
speed and on the feed rate according to the Taylor’s laws.
Figure 14.3: Diagram of worn cutting tool
Figure 14.4: Relation between cutting time and wear for different tools
14.3 Taylor’s laws and cost model

The same level of wear can be reached with different machining parameters (in particular cutting speed and feed
rate), so we need a law to find the best solution in terms of performances (in particular cutting time and costs).
This can be done with the Taylor’s law:
29A double shell tank with vacuum (very low pressure) between them that works as thermal insulator
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v c · Tn · f m = C
Where:
• vc is the cutting speed [m/min]
• T is the tool life [s]
• f is the feed rate [mm/rev]
The other terms of the expression are experimental coefficients that depend on the tool, on the cooling system and
on the out-service wear level.
With this relation we can calculate the expected tool life (in time) as a function of the cutting parameters, to
calculate the time and the cost of the machining process with the following relations:
t =t + V ( tcu
p 0 1+
MRR T
V
Cp = C0 + Cm · tp + Cut ·
MRR · T
Where:
• t0 is the time required for the setup [min]

• V is the total amount of material that has to be removed [mm3]
• MRR is the material removal rate [mm3/s]
• tcu is the time needed to change a tool [s]

• C0 is the setup cost [€]
• Cm is the machining cost per unit of time [€/h]
• Cut is the cost of a cutting edge of the insert [€]
Note that the ratio VMRR
represents the effective time we spent in machining. Then pay attention in using consisting
unit on measurement in any term of the equation.
With these relations we can find the cutting speed that offers the minimum total time or the minimum total cost
of the process. Using cryogenic cooling bot time and cost are decreased respect to a standard cutting configuration.
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15 Tools and solutions for machining
15.1 Shallow and depth cryogenic treatment
Another application field for cryogenic is a thermal treatment for tools and other components. There are two variant
of the process according to the final characteristics required:
1. Shallow cryogenic treatment:
• the piece is cooled down at -196 °C for at least 5 hours and then in brought back at room temperature
2. Depth cryogenic treatment:
• cooling down at -196 °C in 4-10 hours
• keeping the piece at this temperature for 6-40 hours
• warming up to ambient temperature in 4-10 hours
• possible thermal treatment arround 150 °C
Obviously the second one archive better results but it is also more expensive, the material is tempered at a low
temperature and becomes more harder. These processes can be used to increase the resistance of tools. In particular
the insert “L” and the insert “LC” that are tungsten carbides with TiAlN coating, whose performance can be seen
in figure 14.4.
Figure 15.1: Cryogenic thermal treatment diagram
Figure 15.2: Shallow and depth thermal treatment
15.2 Machining setup

When cryogenic cooling system is used in turning, the LN2 can be supplied by internal channels on the tool as
shown in figure 15.3. This solutions is relatively easy and guarantee better performance than an external cooling
flow.
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Figure 15.3: Cryogenic cooling in turning
In general in milling the situation is more complex because the tool will rotate. There are three possible
configurations for the cryogenic cooling system:
1. External flow cooling: very simple but it cools down the workpiece, so it is never used.
2. Internal delivery thought the spindle. In this solution the working zone is free from additional pipes, but
there is an insulated pipe trough the rotating spindle.
3. Internal delivery thought a slip ring. In this case the insulated pipes don’t pass near critical area but they
are on the working area (negative point). Otherwise this technology can be installed on existing machine at
the price to increase the head length (vibration and bending problems).
In any case, the LN2 must arrive in liquid phase at the nozzle, otherwise the cooling effect is lost. To avoid this
problem there is a subcooler that will cool down the liquid to compensate the next thermal dispersion (that will
heat the LN2).
Figure 15.4: Cryogenic cooling in milling: spindle technology (left) and slip ring technology (right)
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Part V
High performance in Machine Tools
Machine tools (MT) are used for manufacturing different types of products and applications. As an example, in
aerospace field, they are involved in the society challenge of emissions reduction that it is related to a technological
challenge; machine tools develop advanced materials processing in order to work with different materials (like
composites or titanium alloys) that have a lower impact on the environment. In fact, considering the elements of
an airplane, as shown in fig.15.5, using composites material (almost 50%) instead of aluminum alloys, we work with
less weight parts to have less fuel consumption and so achieve a reduction of the emissions.
Figure 15.5: Example of different applications.
In advance, MT can also be used in energy or automotive and tractors fields in order to improve processes
performance and efficiency and get more precision.
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16 MT system
The system is a complex mechatronic system (as shown in fig.16.1), composed by:
• Structural part: in this example case considering in the figure, it is composed by column and a spindle that
puts the tool in rotation;
• Fixing system in order to holding the workpiece;
• Mechanical part, composed of the motor and transmission;
• Electronical part (drives)
• Sensors in order to measure the real trajectory;
• Software part (numerical controller): it control the drives and the exits of the machine (the measurements
made by sensors). Thanks to it, we can modified the trajectory through a close-loop feedback control system
interacting with drives and so motor and transmission and so achieve the target trajectory.
Figure 16.1: Example of a machine tool system.
17 MT Performance
In order to improve performance of machine tools, we have to work on different aspects, in particular on static and
dynamic behaviors so that we can obtain more precision (important performance parameters). Before analyze how
performance can change, it is important to underline which are the causes of errors; they can be related to:
• Workpiece: as an example, it can be positioned not in the right way due to wrong workpiece reference or
wrong workpiece holding. Other errors are connected to wrong tool, programming errors and also errors of
machine tool operator.
• Structural deformation: cutting forces between workpiece and machine that can affect overall performance; in
advance, errors are related to static deflection (due to weight of workpiece or of machine), inertial or thermal
deformation (motor and the process itself heat and so we have to cool down some parts), vibrations and
foundation dimensional errors (machine structure, guideways).
• Tool wear
• Errors due to position sensors: we can’t find correctly error in trajectory and during the process.
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• Imposed trajectory tracking errors: machine can’t follow it.
Main performance parameters (the relevance of each one depends on several aspects like markets or applications)
are:
• High accuracy
• High productivity
• Low cost
• Low energy consumption and environmental impact
• High reliability
17.1 Accuracy
Accuracy in finishing operations is a very important performance parameter that can represent like the first design
parameter. In order to improve it, the static stiffness is an important machine tool property that must be
considered: it can be used to estimate the machine tool structure response to constant loads (e.g. weight) or to the
average value of variable loads.
Figure 17.1: Hole making process force and deflection.
In fact, if we consider the hole making process illustrated in fig.17.1, the tool is deflected by cutting forces and
so we obtain a different hole diameter. To avoid this phenomena, we have to increase the static stiffness since the
deflection is connected to the average force and to the stiffness of the machine by the equation:
Fx = KX,X static ∗ ∆x
So, since Faverageis considered constant, in order to reduce the deflection ∆x we have to increase the static
stiffness.
Note that increase the static stiffness is one of the first guideline using from MT designers to generally design
the machines. To maximize the stiffness, some experiments can be done with different configurations to estimate it
or it can be calculate as in the follow example.
Considering the representation of a MT in figure 17.2, we can see the force and we can model all the stiffness of
the machine in a quite easy way, considering the overall static stiffness as a series of the stiffness of each component:
1
∆xtot = ∆xi = F ∗ 1 =
ki = F ki F∗
i=1:N i=1:N K
1
where = overall static compliance. In this way, the limiting stiffness is the less stiffness element that plays
K
the most important role since it is a series of stiffness; as a consequence, in order to maximize performance, we have to
improve this element.
82
Figure 17.2: Example of MT stiffness modeling (first rough evaluation).
17.2 Productivity
Even if the MT designers typically design the machine considering the static stiffness, some machine performances
are not strictly connected to this specification because we have to consider also the dynamic behavior of the MT,
especially in modern machine and so the dynamic performance; for this reason, we have to consider machine tool
productivity. In this way, it is needed to evaluate two aspects:
• the tracking requirements: the MT must be able to follow correctly complicate trajectory in the short time
as possible without any errors in order to elaborate complex geometry components in an appreciate way (like
the blades of turbine);
• MRR (Material Removal Rate) maximization: it is the goal for rough operations when it is remove
80-90% of the material of the workpiece. In this cases, we want to remove as much material as possible per
unit of time because this operations can waste a lot of time. In order to maximize it, there is two options:
– increase the velocity, but there are some limitations according with the life of the tool (too much velocity
implicates much wear);
– increase the chip section, but if it is increased too much, we have more vibrations that limit the produc-
tivity.
These vibration issues due to cutting process can lead to unacceptable surface quality (as shown in fig.17.3 ) and
undesired effects like breakages or damaging; these problems increment production time due to machine stops. So,
in order to remove vibrations, it is needed to limit the chip sections and so the MRR.
Figure 17.3: Examples of vibration effects.
83
18 MT Dynamics
As said before, machine tool dynamics are related to the performance. MT system can be model as a multi-degree
of freedoms, represented by the equation [M ]ẍ + [C]ẋ + [K]x = F . To solve and study it, modal approach can be
used to decoupling the equations and so we obtain modal exquation [M ]q̈ + [C]q̇ + [K̄ ]q = F ; in this way, we can
found the natural frequencies and the eigenmodes of the system.
Figure 18.1: Modal approach.

Considering the vibrations of the whole structure, it is possible to notice that they are characterizes by low
1 kmi
frequencies (as an example, f i = = 19 Hz, where k mi is the modal stiffness); it is due to the fact that
2π mmi
kmi
the modal mass mmi is very high and so ωi = mmi
decreases.
On the contrary, the eigenmodes that involve the vibration of the machine head, spindle and tool are character-
ized by higher frequencies. In this case, problems occurs due to the large range of frequencies (from 10-1000 Hz)
related to different components that has to be considered (as illustrated in fig.18.2) and so we have a complex model
to analyze. In the industries, in order to study this said system in an easier way, they combine modal approach and
experimental approach in order to know unknown parameters related to the unknown variables.
Figure 18.2: Examples of different components of a spindle.
Another critical point is the estimation of the critical damping of the system because it affects the region of the
resonance. In order to study the dynamic behaviour of our system, we have to evaluate the FRF that can be found
hitting with a tip our system to excited the frequencies and so then we can observe them.
1
It is important to have high static stiffness Kstin order to have a lower value of FRF (0) = Kst and high dynamic
stiffness (high eigenmode frequencies, high damping and high dynamic stiffness in order to have low FRF (ωa).
84
Figure 18.3: Example of a FRF of a MT system.
19 MT Vibrations
Vibrational issues are difficult to be studied because several aspects need to be consider. In fact, we have to consider
machine tool and workpiece dynamics, tool geometry, material mechanics and all these aspects are relevant in the
evaluation of the dynamic behavior of a machine tool.
In MT machining there are different sources of vibrations:
1. Forced vibrations : they are the simplest vibrations related due to a periodic force that is applied. We have
so periodic vibrations and this periodic function excites my dynamic system.
Figure 19.1: Example of a forced vibrations occurring during milling process.
2. Regenerative Chatter: regenerative vibration is connected to the capability of the system to store energy.
When i cut, machine vibrates and so its surface is affected by oscillations; so, when the next insert enters in
the workpiece, it cuts a chip that has a thickness affected by these vibrations. In this way, we can said that
the system has memory of the previous case and so the cutting force depends on the previous track left on
the workpiece. If our system is not able to damp and control the vibrations, they grow and so the system
goes to instability (it will be better discussed in the next paragraph). Due to external disturbs, the damped
tool-workpiece vibration leaves on the machined workpiece a specific oscillation (called mark or track, visible
in fig.19.2).
85
Figure 19.2: Effects of chatter vibration on surface quality.
3. Mode coupling & static divergence: it is another source of vibrations due to the non-linearity of the
force consider in the system (for example, force Fc in the 2 dofs system in fig.19.3). In fact, if we linearize it,
we couple the dynamic matrix and so the linearized force terms can affect the stiffness or even the damping
matrix, bringing them to negative values. As a consequence, the system eigenvalues have positive real part
and we can have static divergence or flatter instability that leads our system to instability.
Figure 19.3: Example of instability problems due to non linear force.
Notice that both forced and regenerative vibrations are strictly connected to the machine tool tip dynamic compli-
1
ance ( ) and to machine resonance (eigenvalues)
stif fness
19.1 Regenerative Chatter

As said before, regenerative vibration occurs due to the energy that enters in the machine tool that is not able to
dissipate it and so the vibration recursively grows and it can lead to instability. This phenomena is related to the
delay related to the two different chips, the machine dynamics and the cutting process. For example, in milling
case, the delay between two subsequent tool passages is the origin of the regenerative chatter that is caused by
chip thickness modulation.
We have different case according to this modulation, that are represented in fig.19.4:
• If we work in resonance region, we modulate the chip thickness but we don’t appreciate a phase left and so
we don’t have chatter instability. The only effect of this resonance is forced vibration related to the chip
thickness.
• If we are in the third case where self-excited vibration occurs, we can see a phase left and so modulate chip
thickness. This modulation pumps energy in the system and in case our machine is not able to damp this
vibrations, we have regenerative chatter and vibrations increase.
86
Figure 19.4: Chip thickness modulation.
Due to modulation, regenerative chatter theory deals with the stability of the following system:
Figure 19.5: Chip thickness modulation.
So, in order to perform the analysis of the stability of the closed loop system (cutting process+ machine
dynamics), we can use this next diagram called Stability Lobes Diagram that can be use to select the right cutting
parameters (depth of cut and spindle speed) that assure a stable cutting.
Figure 19.6: Stability Lobes Diagram.
The diagram is made by a series of lobes that splits the plane in two region (upper part generally has chatter
vibration and so unstable cutting) but it doesn’t have a general trend. Due to this fact, this phenomena is difficult
to control during cutting operations because if we change velocity, sometimes we can find a worse behavior that the
previous case and so it is hard to manage. In order to perform cutting operations, this diagram can be used as an
instrument to try to adjust and optimize our parameters (for example, the MRR) in order to have a stable cutting,
avoid chatter vibration.
A solution to suppress this unwanted phenomena is to use a spindle speed variation. In this way we don’t
give to vibration the time to increase its energy changing the velocity of the spindle, even if we remove the same
material due to the fact that average spindle space is constant. Another option, is to create an active system (smart
controller) related to our cutting head that can detected chatter vibrations and so control the velocity in real time
in order to find the best solution, without any previous measurement.
87
Part VI
Laser
20 Introduction
Figure 20.1: System
The system is characterized by different elements:

• Laser source
– Chiller: it it useful to cool down the laser source
• Reflecting mirror: used to modify the trajectory of the laser beam
• Laser head: we have the feed of gasses
– Focusing lens30: it reduces the diameter of the laser beam
Laser is a very versatile technology because by changing the focusing properties, you can change very easily the
spot size and the type of application according to the specific energy density that we are conveying to the surface
How laser beam interacts with the material: the interaction between the laser beam and the surface depends
on:
1. Material: how it is able to absorb the energy
2. Beam: property of the beam like the wavelength λ.
After the laser beam hit a surface of a material, starting from an energy I, a part of that will be reflected31
and another part will be absorbed. The beam inside the material interacts with the electrons of the material,
exciting them which will be movable and this excitation will be transformed in temperature rise32
Figure 20.2: Laser beam hitting a surface

30
making a reference with waterjet it takes place of the nozzle
31
Energy wasted and depending on the material reflection and transparence
32That’s why laser is consider a thermal process
88
I: amount of energy starting from a laser beam
s : skin thickness is the amount of mm where the laser absorbed (thin for metal and longer for non metal)
As we can see in Fig.20.3 the trend for the Energy penetration in a metallic material follow an exponential law.
Knowing that the skin thickness s in the inverse of the absorption factor33 α (s = 1/α) we can calculate the amount
of energy penetrate into the material at = = ( = ) = (0) −2αz = (0) −2s✄ 1 (0) −2 = 0 135 (0).
s =
z s ⇒ It z s It e It e ✄ It e . ·It
By this relation we understand that at a depth equal to s, the transmitted power is cut down by about 86 % and at
a depth equal to 2s, the power is reduced by 98 %. This power is absorbed by the material and transformed into
heat, the remaining percentage will continue going more depth into the material.
Figure 20.3: Penetration of the laser in metals and non metals materials
We can NOT select :
• the wavelength λ because it depend on the light generated by the source

• the amount of absorbed energy that will be It (0)
• the material by the constrain of the application
The only thing that we can select are:
• the total amount of power we give to the material, and we regulate it by focusing the beam
• the interaction time34 τ
So by changing the amount of interaction time of a given surface τ , and by changing the amount of incident power
I, we can play with the laser beam making feasible for any type of application
20.1 Physics of the laser

Light has a duality representation: wavy and particle
Figure 20.4: Wave-Particle duality

33
Typical of every interaction between the laser beam and the material
34Strictly correlated to the traveling speed
89
20.1.1 Wave formulation
Laser is made of light that is an electromagnetic field. In our case it will travel in a very specific direction and
we will have two different fields that are orthogonal one with each other, one is the magnetic field and the other
the electric field. So to define a magnetic field we can have a spatial representation like in fig. 20.5 when we fix the
time, or a time representation when we fix the space35. ( \
Ey (z, t) = Ey0 · sin (ωt − γz + ϕ) = Ey0 · sin (vt − z) + ϕ
2π
λ
ω : angular velocity [rad/s]
ϕ : phase [rad] →a property of the laser beam is that the phase of the different waves is zero ϕ = 0
v : travel velocity of light in a give medium [m/s]
λ : wave length36 [m] distance between to peaks in the spatial representation of the electromagnetic field.
λ·f =v
τ : period [s] defined in the time representation
Figure 20.5: Space and time representation of a magnetic field
The laser light could be in visible or infrared light range (λ from 0.7 µm to 1 mm)
20.1.2 Particle formulation
Figure 20.6: Particle formulation
The laser beam can be represented as a group of tiny particles called photons that have the same mass and the
same energy. Photon is the minimum possible quantity into which the energy from light can be divided. The photon
is correlated with the frequency of the light or connected to λ, so if we know λ we know the photon energy ef too.
c
ef = h · f = h
λ
h : Planck constant
35
To have both you will need a gif
36When we defined it we define also the frequency f because the velocity v is fix in a given medium
90
21 Laser operation mechanism
The stimulated emission is a special mechanism that generates light at give frequency and wavelength and it
is optically amplified in the resonating cavity (which is our laser source) and in order to provide the stimulated
emission we need a mechanism called population inversion
If we give a photon of energy to an atom, it will absorb it an its electron will jump to an higher energetic level37.
So when we provide a photon of energy, our system will go from a stable level e0 to the excited or stimulated level
e1. The energy that we are given is equal to
e1 − eo = hf10
where the frequency is strictly associated to the two energetic level38
Spontaneously, after a short time the electron will come back to its previous energy level and it will back to the
environment the photon that is has absorbed.
Figure 21.1: Absorption and give away of a photon of energy from an atom
We wants that this phenomena never occur in laser. We want our atom to be found in the excited level.
We call Stimulated emission the phenomena in which we hit an atom with more than one photon, without
giving the time to the atom to spontaneously decay. Doing so, the atom will emit all the photon received at the
same time increasing the power (not the energy)
Figure 21.2: Stimulated emission
This representation of only 2 levels was only didactic, in reality we have at least 3 level. We have the level 0
called ground level that is the stable level. If we occasionally give an external energy there will be some atom at
level 2 and 1 but most of them will be at the ground level. If we give energy with an external source39 we pump
the atom as many as we can to the excited level, then will have 2 spontaneous decays: the first one to the first
level and the second one to the ground level. This two decays take place in two different times. The first decay
will be very fast and the second one will be slow. So there are a lot of atoms at level 1, forming like a queue. If
37
the electron will travel on a larger trajectory
38
For each atom that goes to level 0 to level 1 is associate a frequency f10
39General in laser we need an external energy source that can be electrical current or a pumping light
91
the number of atoms at level one N1 > N0 + N2 so at level one we have more than 50 % of the total atoms, we
have the condition that is called population inversion. Population inversion occurs when we have more atoms
at the excited level than at the stable level. It is absolutely necessary in order for the laser phenomenon (which
is the stimulated emission), to take place. If we don’t have population inversion we can not have continuous laser
emission
Figure 21.3: Three level explanation of stimulated emission
There are only certain media that can become laser active medium because we need several conditions:
1. They need to have an energetic level of their atoms which can emit at the frequency which is in the visible
region or infrared
2. The active medium must be an amplify medium, and it depend only on the decay time
Figure 21.4: Difference between a dumping medium and amplification medium
21.1 Pumping
21.1.1 Electrical pumping
In order to have an amplification we must have two mirrors at the end of the tube. Without the mirror we can’t
have population inversion, because this phenomena needs an external energy source that in this case is a electrical
voltage difference.
Figure 21.5: Electrical pumping
We apply a voltage difference between two electrodes and if the voltage is high enough we brake the tension
of the gas so we ionize the gas inside, so current will flow inside the tube, and this electrons that moves convey
the energy to have the material excited. But this external energy is not enough, what really fuel the population
92
inversion is the laser itself: when the laser is created, it will be entrap inside the resonating cavity and will start
going back and forth continuously hitting new atoms and so it will self sustain. Only from one of the two mirror
we let out a tiny amount of power∼( 2 − 1%) that is our laser beam. But most of the energy must remain entrap
inside the resonating cavity in order to have a stable population inversion
21.1.2 Optical pumping

If our medium is not a gas but it is a crystal we have optical pumping. For example if we have a ruby bar it will
not conduct any electricity, so we can’t provide energy electrically, but we can provide energy optically. We can use
a Pump lamp to trigger the population inversion inside the solid bar
Figure 21.6: Optical pumping
21.1.3 Resonator
Figure 21.7: Resonating cavity
The two mirror in the previously cited resonating cavity or resonator are slightly curved in order to direct the lasers
beams in the center of the medium, so it means that due to the mirror’s shape, the center of the bar will be more
energetic than the periphery. The two mirrors are placed at a distance that is a multiple of the wavelength λ, so
thanks to this fact all the laser wave are phased40. The best possible shape is called Gaussian shape in which we
can find the most energetic level on the center.
Figure 21.8: Gaussian shape

40We have to take care of the thermal expansion of the metal that can lead to a change in distance between the two mirrors and so
the wave will not be phased anymore
93
a) Initial unexcited state (laser off)
b) Optical pumping resulting in excited state

c) Beginning of stimulated emission
d) Amplification by stimulated emission due to the shape of the two mirrors

e) continued amplification due to repeated reflection from the end mirrors resulting in subsequent laser output
from the partially reflective mirror
Figure 21.9: Schematic of amplification stages during operation
21.1.4 Efficiency
We have several power loss in laser technologies:
• Power supply → we have an electric efficiency ηE ≈ 90 %
• Pumping energy →we have a pumping efficiency related to the pumping process ηP ≈ 30 − 60 %
• Deposit energy → we have a deposit efficiency due to heat dissipation, incomplete absorption and quantum
efficiency ηD ≈ 5 − 45 %
• Extract laser → we have an extract laser efficiency due to the amount of energy that pass the semi reflective
mirror that can heat up ηL ≈ 50 − 70 %
ηT = ηE + ηP + ηD + ηL = 2 − 20 %
Figure 21.10: Efficiency schematic
If we improve the technology we can improve all the previous efficiency but from a theoretical point of view
we can never go to 100 % because we have quantum efficiency that depend on the material. It comes from the
physics of the stimulated emission because we need to give at first the amount of energy for an electron to go to
level 0 to level 2 (e2 − e0 ) and then we will have the fast spontaneous decay from level 2 to 1 without emission,
and this energy (e2 − e1) will not be used in the laser
ηQ3 = e1 − e0
e2 − e0
94
Figure 21.11: Schematic of the emission of a laser going throw level 0 to level 1
21.2 Properties of laser beam

LASER stands for Light Amplification by Stimulated Emission of Radiation
Figure 21.12: Laser beam going out of the laser source
1. Monochromaticity
2. Collimation
3. Beam Coherence
4. Elevated Brightness
5. Small Beam diameter
6. Different transverse electromagnetic modes
7. Different temporal modes
21.2.1 Monochromaticity
• Laser beam is monochromatic, so it has only one wavelength
• If we have only one monochromatic line we will have only one θ so its behavior will depend on only one
properties
• We have only one focusing point so we can concentrate the beam in a small spot increasing the power decreasing
the area of the spot
Figure 21.13: Monochromaticity
95
21.2.2 Collimation
• Laser beam is very directional and the laser radiation are collimated so follow a parallel rays
• If we want to calculate the divergence of the beam θ after a minimum diameter d0 (the diameter inside the
source) we can use this relationship in which k is a constant depending on the shape (not depend on λ) an it
will minimum for Gaussian shape
θ · d0 = k · λ
Figure 21.14: Monochromaticity
21.2.3 Beam Coherence

• The laser source is made in a certain way that make all the electromagnetic waves go out with the same
phase (ϕ = 0) so there is beam coherence
21.2.4 Elevated Brightness

• The laser radiation will have an elevated brightness or radiance that is the amount of energy per unit
surface
• We can define the radiance B as the power which goes out of the source divided by the surface. If we have
a sphere we have to add to the surface the solid angle α
B= P P 2 W
2 =
πd0 · πα2 (πkλ) strad · m2
• For practical reason we are not interested in how much power goes out of the source, but how much power
hit the target, so in first assumption we can neglect the solid angle, so the power density will be the radio
between the power and the incident surface (that coincide with the diameter of the laser beam if we consider
the laser as a cylinder and we can consider it if we have a Gaussian distribution). So we can define the power
density I as
I= P
S
where the power distribution can be express in Cartesian or polar coordinate
r +∞ r +∞ r +∞ r 2π
Pcartesian = I (x, y) dx dy; Ppolar = I (r, α) rdα dr (21.1)
−∞ −∞ 0 0
96
Figure 21.15: Gaussian distribution
Gaussian Mode If we assume that our power density I is Gaussian it will have this form, in which I0 is a
constant, r0 is a parameter and r is the distance from the center
( \2
r
−
I (r, α) = I 0e r0
−
I (r, α) = I 0e r0
If we integrate the previous function we can calculate the power

( \2
r r
r0
P = 2π 0
+∞ −
I 0e = πI0r2
We call the Gaussian mode as 0
• the fundamental mode because for the Gaussian beam k is the smallest so the B is the highest
• Diffraction limited mode, because is better to work with Gaussian mode with optics and focusing length
• TEM41 00
21.2.5 Small Beam diameter

• Referring to eq. 21.1 we can use−∞
and + to
∞define the laser, but we have to put a limit to define the
diameter of the laser beam. For the Gaussian beam we define the radius as it includes 86 % of the beam
power. This number correspond to
√
rG = 2r0
Figure 21.16: Gaussian distribution to understand the diameter of the laser
• In general laser beams have small divergence, so not only we have a very small diameter of the beam but
also it remain small for long distances. We measure the divergence with an angle θ and it is a function of the
wavelength λ. If the beam will not diverge the brightness will be the same over time too
41
Transverse Electromagnetic Modes
97
21.2.6 Transverse Electromagnetic Mode TEM
• A transverse mode of a beam of electromagnetic radiation is a particular electromagnetic field pattern of
radiation measured in a plane perpendicular (i.e. transverse) to the propagation direction of the beam
• The 2 numbers after “TEM” count the number of minimum starting from the center and going throw the x
and y axis. For the Gaussian beam we don’t have any minimum so it is called TEM 00. Looking at the second
figure in fig 21.17 we can see that going on the x axis we can find a minimum , so it is called TEM 10 (for
example it can be used for welding). in the last case we find a minimum going on the x and y axis so TEM 11 .
This classification doesn’t apply if we have a rectangular beam shape
Figure 21.17: Difference between TEM00, TEM10 and TEM11
Usually there will be spurious modes at the periphery of the beam, so in order to eliminate them we can put
some filters inside the resonator in order to have a better beam coherent with the Gaussian mode and it will reduce
the diameter of the beam
Figure 21.18: Filters introduced in the resonator to clean the beam from spurious mode
Quality parameters
One quality parameter is the divergence θ, but it can be generalized, so we can use another parameter M 2 that
is called divergence indicator that tells us if the beam is Gaussian or not and it is non dimensional.
Knowing that θ · d0 = k · λ i know that the minimum k is for the Gaussian beam and it values kG = 4 π = 1.27.
so the Gaussian beam divergence is
4λ
θG =
πd0
So we identify a new non dimensional parameter K that is called beam propagation factor
θG
K= kG 4 0<K<1
θ = k = πk
so we can now define
2 1 M 2≥ 1
M =K
and M 2 = 1 for the Gaussian beam
Another quality parameter is the beam parameter product BPP that is
θd0 λ M2
BPP = = = λ
4 πK π
So smaller BPP is better, so we want M 2 and λ smaller as possible. So if BPP is small it means that we can
reduce a lot the divergence or we can reduce very much the diameter, so we are increasing the brilliance, so we are
increasing the processing rate
98
21.2.7 Temporal modulation
It can be useful to block the laser beam for a certain amount of time because in doing so the power will be higher
because we are storing energy inside the cavity (the overall energy will bge the same). This is the only reason to
use pulse laser.
We can define different quantities:
• pulse period tp and it’s inverse is the pulse frequency
• We can define the pulse duration τ which is shorter than the period and it is defined as the power reach the
half of the peak
• The ratio between the pulse duration and the total period is called duty cycle
Figure 21.19: Temporal modulation
We can have different lasers types

• free running: the output power is modulated maybe by optical pumping or by the electricity → 10−4 s
• Q-switch, we have a rotational mirror with a given speed → 10−9 s
• Mode Locking: → 10−14 s
Q
Given a certain energy Q we know that the power is P = , so with the same energy, reducing the pulse duration
τ
give us more power
99
22 Thermal model
22.1 Heat transfer
Heat transfer can happen only under a difference of temperature between two different areas, so between them there
is a thermal gradient. There are three ways to transfer heat:
• Conduction: heat transfer inside the material between the atoms without transfer of mass
• Convection: heat transfer with also transfer of mass, as between a solid and a gas
• Radiation: transfer of heat through electromagnetic radiation

For the laser process we will take into account only the conduction inside the material, after the laser has heated
up the surface of the piece.
22.1.1 Fourier law

To study a mono directional conduction heat transfer inside the material we can use the Fourier law:
→
− dT →
−
qx ll = −k ix [W/m2] (22.1)
dx
Where k is the thermal conductivity and the sign minus indicates that the thermal flux → −
qx is opposite to the
→
−
thermal gradient along the direction ix . In this equation the thermal conductivity is considered constant but, on
real material, it is strongly dependent on the temperature.
Figure 22.1: Thermal conductivity
For a general 3D problem the Fourier law can be written as:

( \
→
− ∂T →
− ∂T →
− ∂T →
−
q ll = −k∇T = − k ix + k iy + k iy
∂x ∂y ∂y
100
22.1.2 Newton law
This law calculates the heat flux for convection heat transfer, but wi will not use it.
qll = h (Ts − T∞) [W/m2]

Where h is the convection coefficient [W/m 2 K].
22.1.3 First thermodynamic law

The first thermodynamical law is a energy balance on a control volume or a control surface in a certain temporal
length.
E˙in − E˙out + E˙g = E˙st (22.2)

Where:
• E˙in and E˙out are respectively the inflow and outflow of energy on the control surface.
• E˙g is the energy generation term inside the volume due to chemical, electrical or nuclear reaction. We will
never have this term for laser application.
• E˙st is the energy stored inside the material, that is equal to the variation of internal energy42: ∆E˙st = ∆U˙
Then the variation of internal energy can be written as the sum of two terms, the thermal component (it happens
with a change of temperature) and the latent one (phase transition): ∆U˙ = ∆U˙ sen + ∆U˙ l
∂T
∆U ˙ sen = ρ · cp ·
dxdydz (22.3)
∂t
Where ρ is the density [kg/m3] and cp is the specific heat [J/kg].
The variation of internal energy (or the energy stored inside the material) can be seen also as difference between
the inlet and outlet energy. To do this we have to write the inlet/outlet energy flow on each face of the infinitesimal
element represented in figure 22.2.
Ėin = qxll dydz + qyll dxdz + qzll dxdy
Ėout = qxll+dx dydz + qyll+dy dxdz + qzll+dz dxdy

The generic term qnll+dn can be linearized using the Taylor series arrested at the first order
ll ∂qnll
q ll = q + dn
n+dn n
∂n
Then, substituting these energy inside eq. 22.2 and writing the energy flux with the Fourier law (eq. 22.1) we
obtain:
( \ ( \ ( \
∂ ∂T ∂ ∂T ∂ ∂T ∂T
k + k + k = ρ · cp ·
∂x ∂x ∂y ∂y ∂z ∂z ∂t
If k is constant along the three directions (homogeneous material) we can define the thermal diffusivity as:
k m2
α=
ρ · cp s
2 2
∂ T 2
∂ T 1 ∂T
∂ T
∇T = 2 + 2 + 2 = ·
∂x ∂y ∂z α ∂t
We remind that the hypothesis to obtain this final equation are:
• no mass transfer inside the control volume
• no heat source inside the material
42We are neglecting the potential energy and the kinetic one because they will not change significantly
101
• no phase change (we didn’t take into account ∆U˙l)
• homogeneous material
Figure 22.2: Infinitesimal element
If inside the material there is a heat source q˙ the equation can be written as
∂ 2T ∂2T ∂2T q˙ 1 ∂T
+ + + =
·
∂x2 ∂y 2 ∂z 2 k α ∂t
22.1.4 Boundary and initial conditions

On a generic (mono dimensional) thermal problem we can have different type of boundary conditions:
• Surface at constant temperature (a): T (0, t) = Ts

1
• Constant heat flux through a surface (b): −k ∂T 1 = qsll
∂x x=0
∂x
1
• Insulated surface (c): ∂T 1x=0 = 0
∂x
1 x=0 = h [T∞ − T (0, t)]
• Convection on a surface (d): −k ∂T 1
Figure 22.3: Boundary conditions: (a) surface at constant temperature, (b) constant heat flux, (c) insulated surface,
(d) convection
Then, for the initial conditions, we have to define the initial temperature in each point of the body. This
temperature can be different in each point or, if we start from an equilibrium condition, it is constant through the
body: T (x, 0) = Ti
22.2 Solution for 1D problem

102
If we are in presence of a mono dimensional problem, as the one represented in figure 22.4, we can obtain a closed
equation to evaluate the temperature in time and space. The solution is valid under the following hypothesis:
103
• Initial temperature Ti constant on the whole workpiece
• Homogeneous and isotropic material
• Thermal and physical properties constant (strong assumption, see figure 22.1)
• No internal heat source
• 1D semi-infinite geometry
• Pure conduction heat transfer mechanism
Figure 22.4: Mono dimensional thermal problem
22.2.1 Solution: heating phase

For the mono dimensional problem the equation to solve becomes
∂2T 1 ∂T
= ·
∂x2 α ∂t
The boundary and initial conditions are:
• Constant initial temperature: T (x, 0) = Ti
1 ll
• Constant heat flux from the laser: −k ∂T∂x 1x=0 = q0
• Semi-infinite geometry: T (∞, t) = Ti
For this simple problem (for more complex one a numerical solution is required) the solution is
√ ( \
q0ll 4αt x
T (x, t) = Ti + · ierf c √ (22.4)
k 4αt
Where ierfc(x) is the integral of the complementary error function and it has the following behavior.
Figure 22.5: ierfc(x) function
104
√
One important value to remind is its result on the origin, in fact ierfc(0) = 1/ π = 0, 56. So the solution on
the origin can be written as
√
q0ll 4αt
T (0, t) = Ti + √
k· π
22.2.2 Thermal distance

The thermal distance D is the distance from the heated surface where, at a given time t, there is a significant
thermal effect due to the heat source.
√
D= 4αt [m]
This quantity depends on the properties of the material (thermal diffusivity α) and on the time because the
material is heated up by the hot source. This equation is rigorously valid only for 1D problems, but it is used also
on real 3D problem just to give an order of magnitude and an indicative value.
With this value we can check the semi-infinite hypothesis: the thickness of the piece must be at least two
times the thermal distance.
If we calculate the temperature, at the instant of time t, for x = D and x = 2 · D we will obtain that:
• At the thermal distance, the thermal effect is almost the 10% of the one on the surface: T (D, t) − Ti =
0, 086 (T (0, t) − Ti) ':: 10% (T (0, t) − Ti)
• At two times the thermal distance, the thermal effect is almost the 0,1% of the one on the surface: T (2D, t) −
Ti = 0, 0009 (T (0, t) − Ti) ':: 0, 1% (T (0, t) − Ti)
So, if our thickness s is at least two times the thermal distance, we can neglect the thermal effect on the cold side:
T (s, t)'::T ( ∞, t) = Ti
Otherwise, if s < 2 ·D (for example if we heat up the surface for too much time) the temperature is too high,
when the heat flux reaches the other side it is mirrored inside the piece as shown in figure 22.6 (b).
Figure 22.6: Semi-infinite body: (a) hypothesis verified, (b) hypothesis not verified
22.2.3 Solution: cooling phase

Once the input heat flux is removed, the hot material starts cooling down. To calculate the temperature in each
point of the body and for each instant of time during this phase, we need another closed equation. This one can be
derived with the superimposition of the effect as shown in figure 22.7, where τ is the instant of time in which we
switch off the laser.
Figure 22.7: Superimposition of the effect with a heat sink at time τ
105
So, for t > τ we have to add the effect of the heat sink, that can be evaluated with the following equation
/ (
ll 4α (t − τ ) x
T (x, t) = Ti − 0 q · ierf c /
k 4α (t − τ )
Summing this equation to eq. 22.4 we can obtain the following solution (valid only for t > τ ):
r ( \ (
q0ll √ x / x
T (x, t) = T i + 4αt · ierf c √ − 4α (t − τ ) · ierf c /
k 4αt 4α (t − τ )
In figure 22.8 is rappresented an example of this solution. In particular we can see that after the laser is switched
off, the material under the surface is still increasing its temperature due to the hot one above it.
Figure 22.8: Solution before and after the laser is switched off (τ = 1 µs) for different positions z from the surface
106
23 Laser-material interaction
23.1 Power absorbed by the material
After generating the laser beam we could summarize the interaction process with the material with the picture
below:
Figure 23.1: Scheme of laser-material interaction.
The incident beam has a certain power, called just for having a reference Pi, that depends on the characteristic
of the beam itself and way of producing it, then a certain fraction of the power is absorbed, named Pt and another
fraction that is reflected by the material, that is Pr . While ϑi is the angle between the normal to the surface and
the direction of the incident beam and will be equal to ϑr that is the reflected angle, so we know how to calculate
and forecast the direction of the reflected beam. On the contrary what happens inside the material depends on
what kind of material is, but for surely the beam is slowed down (the speed decreases) and with the decrease of
speed the transmitted angle will also decrease. But if the material is transparent, for instance glass, the beam
will propagate inside the material and transmitted outside the material, so, in other words if the sheet thickness
is greater than the skin thickness, that is the thickness in which about 86% of the power is absorbed, there is no
transmission outside the material but on the contrary if the material tends to be transparent, that means the skin
thickness is larger than the sheet thickness there will be some transmission (remember that by doubling up the skin
thickness we obtain the thickness referred to the complete absorption).
But we are not really interested to the direction of the transmitted beam, specially with metals, because as
the beam is absorbed by the metal material there will be some scattering phenomena inside it that may cause
discontinuity to the transmission so in someway it is propagated.
23.2 Coefficient of absorption

We can call the ratio between the the transmitted power and the incident power as A, that is the coefficient of
absorption:
A= Pt
Pi
While we call the ratio between the reflected power and the incident power as R, that is the coefficient of
reflection:
R= Pr
Pi
It is obvious that the sum between A and R must be equal to one because the total incident beam subdivides
itself into two different beams, the reflected and the absorbed end eventually transmitted, with their relative power:
P i = Pt + P r
A+R=1
So our useful power that we use in our calculations will always be the product between A and Pi or the product
between A and the power density, which is the ratio between the power and the spot size surface.
The coefficient A depends on several factors:
• wavelength
107
• laser source
• material we are working with
• surface roughness : if we make the surface rough, the incident beam will be reflected inside the asperities
of the surface and A increases. So if the roughness increases the coefficient of absorption A increases
• Temperature: it is the main problem because A does not remain constant during the process as it appears
in the previous pictures, in fact as we start the process the temperature can increase very rapidly according
to the material and if temperature increases also the absorption coefficient starts to increase and it is good.
So we need to be very patient enough and wait in order to have higher values of A and if we are able to create
a microscopic layer of liquid metal or vapor on the top of the surface then the coefficient of absorption sudden
increase and so the process, a cutting or a welding, now can start.
Figure 23.2: Dependence between A and the temperature.
Unfortunately the coefficient of absorption A is not so much in most the materials and industrial application.
For example, as it is possible to see in the following picture on the left, in the industrial application with CO2 gas
(to understand why we use CO2 read the laser fundamentals) A is lower than 20%, so there will be at least 80%
of the power that is reflected but nevertheless, with this tiny power it is however possible to improve the cutting
processes. We could see also that the situation improves with non metal materials (like plastic or polymers) and
specially with CO2 lasers.
On the right we could see for example that aluminum has a peak of absorption for the wavelength equal to
1µm, so it would be better to cut aluminum parts with this wavelength to improve the process. Another interesting
note is that apparently CO2 is the worst option for most materials but it is the first that was invented and used
industrially so it is expected to be most cost efficient laser source.
Figure 23.3: The behavior of A in function of the wavelength and the materials: on the left it is shown a general
chart while on the right it is shown a particular about the metals material.
So if we want to calculate the incident heat flow on the surface we should consider the incident power and the
surface but we should consider that in laser/welding process, laser is not a stationary source, it’s a traveling source
108
with a giving speed or so called feed rate. So the interaction time in the spot size will be equal to the ratio between
the the diameter of the spot (ds) on the surface and the feed rate of the beam (v):
τ= ds
v
Figure 23.4: Particular of the spot and the fact that the laser source is moving during the process.
So the absorbed heat flow on the source will be equal to:

qs = = 4
= A·Ii
// Pt A·Pi
S Π · d2s
In which I represents the incident power density, so dimensionally is W/m 12 . While if we want calculate the
i 1
absorbed energy density J/m2 .:
Fa = A · Ii · τ
109
24 Methods of laser cutting
In the following picture we could see a typical layout of cutting process and its typical parameters.We have:
• the laser beam that comes from the source

• The laser beam arrives at the focusing lens, that can be adjusted vertically so that we can modify the focus
and so the spot size on the surface of the work-piece,
• the cutting gas is injected up on the lens because one of the purpose of the gas is to protect the lens from
sparks or liquid metals or vapor that may come from cutting region and can make the lenses opaque causing
a inefficient transmission of the power. So we have this jet outside the focusing lens at low pressure that
follows a restriction (nozzle) causing an increase in speed of the jet that will interact with the material. If the
pressure is high enough the jet is able to blow away the material: so the pressure give support to the process
because it helps to get rid of the material removed with the interaction between the laser and the material,
that is called dross or fused material.
Figure 24.1: Typical laser cutting layout.
• Cutting head: we have the laser source/emitter followed by a reflective mirror, focusing lens with the capability
of modifying the height so to modify the focus and then the spot size, then it is possible to see the nozzle
with the gas inlet. The material of the lens can be quartz or other transparent material. The nozzle can vary
between 0.5–2 mm for metals depending on what we have to do with metals, while 1-3 mm for non metals.
The pressure of the gas may be in the range of 0.2-2 MPa, but also further, and the functions of the gas are
to blow away the liquid or vapor metal that comes from the interaction region, to protect the lens in order to
keep them efficient in transmitting the power, but also to cool down the lens and in some cases, we may have
reactive gas in order to realize oxydation and so speed up the process by increasing the feed rate.
110
Figure 24.2: Laser cutting head and its components.
We can obtain a very big versatility by changing three parameters: that are velocity (feed rate), diameter of
the spot ( and so with the velocity, the interaction time) and the power of the beam.
1. Heat treatment: playing with Ii and τ in order to have short intensity and short interaction time we will
only have heat conduction on the surface (they will not be described appropriately in this book)
2. Conduction welding, melt and blow cutting (sec 24.2): Increasing the value of Ii and τ we are increasing
the power absorbed by the surface of the material and we make the material melt. There are two options
with fusion.
(a) Melt and blow: in this process we don’t care about the axial HAZ but we do it about the lateral HAZ
because after the cutting we may be interested on the quality of the lateral surface, so for instance the
roughness.
(b) Reactive melting: that means we have an active gas for example pure oxygen or air. Due to the high
temperature the surfaces will oxidate very fast and due to the fact that the oxidation is a exothermic
reaction there will be an internal generation of heat, that is significant, and it allows us to double up the
feed rate and so speed up the process. So for example with mild steel we can go faster than a stainless
steel (but not because the last one doesn’t oxidize at high temperature, because it does but because the
stainless steel at high temperature is not stainless any more).
3. Cutting by vaporization (sec 24.3): remembering that as the material melts the coefficient of absorption
increases (jump), it is possible to vaporize the material. Of course if we are talking about metals we need
a lot of energy but if we talk about non metals it doesn’t need so much energy. Through vaporization it is
possible to achieve high quality surface, better than the fusion mechanism.
4. Keyhole welding (sec: 27): if we have vapor there are some chances that we may have also a layer of plasma
(ionized metal at very high temperature) between the laser source and the material and the problem is that
the plasma have different properties with respect to the classic state of gas, and the thermodynamic laws
completely change: in some cases the formation of plasma is not a problem because in some ways heat is
transmitted more on the axial direction instead of radial direction and so we can go deeper inside the material
without having a large HAZ (keyhole).
5. Ablation (sec 24.1): f we have a high power density and a short interaction time we don’t let time to the
material to conduct heat inside the material itself so we can remove material practically with no HAZ. In that
case, if we are able to remove a very tiny layer of material only on the surface without having HAZ
111
Figure 24.3: Different ways of using lasers just by changing the intensity and the interaction time.
24.1 Laser ablation with pulsed laser

Changing the interaction time we can have different types of laser ablation processes 1
If we move further we have a continuous laser and the peak power reach 106 W/cm2 which is very little if
compared to the cold ablation or the hot ablation.
Figure 24.4: Intensity of the laser beam with the variation of the interaction time for pulsed laser.
24.1.1 Cold ablation

• If the interaction time is shorter than 1ps (picoseconds) we talk about the so called “ultrashort pulse” and
with this we are able to make the cold ablation also on metals, so we remove material because the relaxation
time of the electrons is longer than the interaction time, so the atomic bonds break without any time for heat
propagation inside the material. our pulse wave hits the target and only the target will be removed from the
material.
• The rest of the material does not even know about the interaction that has happened. This happens specially
when our penetration depth is significantly smaller than twice the skin depth, and so only with ultrashort
pulse. In this case we will not have any type of HAZ
112
• It is possible to do cold cutting, or cold ablation, even with relatively low power and without using femtoseconds
lasers, and this is possible generally with organic materials like plastic or human issues like human surgery. It
is possible because with low power ( let’s say in the range between 7 and 20) we use UV lasers: they emit at
a wavelength that is well below the typical threshold of the industrial lasers of 1µm, at least about 0.35µm (
so in the UV range below the visible region) and remembering that the energy of photons increases with the
decrease of the wavelength, as soon as they hit the material they directly break the atomic bonds without
thermal action(so without heating the material). So we are removing bits of material with an electromagnetic
interaction and not burning them, like plastic or human issues.
It’s not so used industrially, but specially it is spread in human surgery or in realizing electronic components for
example.
24.1.2 Hot ablation

1
If the interaction time is a bit longer, so from 1ps to 1 ns: in that case the power peak can go up to 1015 W/cm 2
1
(compared to 1016∼22 W/cm2 of the cold ablation) but there is some time to conduct heat inside the material so
we may have microscopic region of HAZ.
In the following picture, on the right, we can see the result that is a microscopic drill obtained by hot laser
ablation. We can see a very little conicity at the entry but nevertheless it’s a very ultraprecision geometry. But as
we told before, with hot laser ablation there will be a small generation of liquid metal that can be removed from
the top as the vapor or the plasma that may be generated, as it is possible to see on the left picture. We may have
also overheated liquid, so liquid at high temperature than the melting temperature because of the high pressure
that is not caused by the gas but by the metal force inside the material. If the overheated liquid causes problems
we may get rid of it just by realizing a head passing hole.
Figure 24.5: Hot laser ablation, particoular in drilling application.
Figure 24.6: Difference in thermal distance and penetration for hot and cold ablation
24.1.3 Melt expulsion

If we exceed the interaction time of 1ns up to 1µs we can perform the melt expulsion that is very similar to the
“melt and blow mechanism”. With this mechanism we are able to work at the phase change of the material, so
between liquid and vapor, and the quality surface, if compared to the previous one obtained through hot ablation,
presents some visible asperities that characterize the roughness but the dimension are comparable.
113
Figure 24.7: Melt expulsion. On the left a particular about the roughness and the geometry obtained, on the right
the interaction mechanism and a diagram h-T that wants to clarify the phases we are working with.
24.2 Fusion cutting

Talking about this cutting mechanism we have not any more pulsed laser but continuous laser and so a continuous
removing material. As we said before we have two options, the “reactive fusion cutting” and the “melt and blow”
option, which are very similar except for the use of the reactive gas in the first option mentioned.
24.2.1 Melt and blow cutting

• It is used for stainless steel with lower thickness
• The quality is very good

• Compared to the reactive fusion cutting, the velocity is lower and we need to use an inert gas which has a
cost, for example argon, nitrogen or helium.
• The evolution of the cutting kerf progression both in melt and blow cutting and in reactive fusion cutting
(but also in water cutting) are similar because the shape of the cutting kerf laterally and frontally are similar
• The triangular profile of the cutting kerf happens when we have a vertical propagation of the material removal
process which can be lower than the axial propagation (transfer speed) although generally we don’t see uncut
triangle.
• On the surfaces it is typical to see the striations, also presented in water jet cutting: there are several theories
that try to explain why the striations are generated and the most valuable theory is called “step theory” in
which we need a critical droplet size that cause the melt to pulsate in size before it can be blown free: due to
the fact that this droplet has a certain periodicity, we see it remarked on the surface, as it is possible to see
in the following pictures.
Figure 24.8: Particoular of striations on the left and the mechanism of removing material on the left.
114
Model of the power for unit thickness in function of the cutting speed
Talking about the process parameters we can make now an analysis that can be applied also in the other ways
of cutting like the vaporization or the reactive fusion cutting and, in some cases also in the welding processes. The
idea is to have from one side the product of the coefficient A and P (not the power density), which represents the
fraction of the total incident power that can be absorbed by the material (so taking into account that a part of
the incident power will be reflected) and this should be equal, according to this theoretical model, to the product
between w, which is the average cutting kerf width, t, that is the thickness of the sheet, v, that is the cutting speed.
Remember that this product is the material removal rate (w t ·v =· MRR) so the volume we are removing per
unit time. By multiplying this volume (MRR) for the density of the material ρ and the specific heat of the
material cp, times the difference between Tf (fusion temperature) and Ta(ambient temperature), we are calculating
the power needed to take the temperature of the material up to the melting temperature.
As we said before, in this process we have also to melt the material so we don’t want just to reach the melting
temperature but we want the material that is removed is also melted: that’s why we have to consider also the latent
heat of fusion Lf . Moreover, remembering that also in this kind of process a tiny quantity of the material vaporizes,
in order to take into account this fact, we simply add the product between the fraction mass of melt vaporized,m ,
times the latent heat of vaporization, Lv .
( \
A · P = w · t · v · ρ · cp · (Tf − Ta) + Lf + m · Lf
/
where:
P = Incident power [W ]
w= Average kerf width (m)
t= Thickness(m)
v= Cutting speed (m/s)
m = Fraction of melt vaporized
Lf = Latent heat of fusion (J/kg)
Lv = Latent heat of vaporization (J/kgK)
Tf = Fusion temperature (K)
Ta=Ambient temperature (K)
A= absorption coefficient density (kg/m3)
cp=thermal capacity (J/kgK)
Figure 24.9: Scheme of the process geometrical parameters
The problem is that we don’t know the value of m and so we have to make an estimation ( in most of the cases
we just guess). For a given material, dividing for the product w· t· v· A on the left we obtain a constant because the
coefficient A, the density ρ, the specific heat cp, the latent heat of fusion and vaporization Lf and Lv are properties
of the material, while ∆T and ml are constant. So:
( \
= cost = · cp · (Tf − Ta) + Lf + m · Lf
P ρ /
w·t·v A
Thence the process parameters that are fundamental in order to reach the versatility that characterized this
process are the terms shown on the left side of the equation. This model is very simple because it does not take into
account the variability of A from the temperature previously shown, but also the variability ofcp from temperature
115
or the variability of ρ with temperature and the fact that ml is just a guess. But surprisingly it works with some
variations or some distortions.
Here there are some charts that plot the power for unit thickness in function of the cutting speed, with constant
cutting kerf, for a given material and with a certain gas.
Figure 24.10: Power per unit thickness in function of the material and with the cutting speed.
As it is possible to see the experiments give, through the regression method, a result that is predicted by the
model presented before: for example the linearity of the power with the cutting speed (with the other parameters
fixed or constant). Note also the fact that the power needed in the case of reactive fusion is lower than the melt
and blow solution, because as it was said before, in reactive fusion melting, part of the power needed is given by
the oxidation which is an exothermic reaction.
24.2.2 Reactive fusion cutting

• It is usually used for high thickness material
• It is much faster and so it has an higher productivity, with some material it does not leave any oxides because
they are usually blown away by the gas. But only some alloys are allowed.
• It is characterized by the use of an active gas which takes part into the process by oxidizing the material and
so giving extra energy to the process. It is possible to see it in the following chemical formula:
x · Me + y · O2 → MexO2x + ∆H
in which ∆H is the reaction energy[KJ/mol]. There are materials, for instance the chrome inside the stainless
steel, that provide a lot of energy when oxidizes. From that point of view it’s better to work with stainless
steels that contain chrome because of the large additional energy but the point is that in these kind of steels
the oxides have a very high melting point and freeze very rapidly creating an irregular coat on the surface
that is unwanted. On the contrary is very good working with iron or mild steels because even if the amount
of energy provided by the reaction is smaller, if compared with other metals, the oxides are very simple to be
blown away by the gas (melted an blown away).
• Again in reactive fusion cutting we have striations but the theory, that tries to explain their formation, is not
the step theory presented in melt an blow mechanism but a theory that is related to the oxidation phenomenon
which is explosive: the idea is that if the temperature increases inside the material it will reach a certain point
at which the oxidation is triggered causing a small explosion that generates a small enlargement in the cutting
kerf, but if the cutting kerf enlarges, the temperature will decreases below the oxidation temperature. Then
there will be a subsequent heating phase and so the same mechanism explained: the result will be the striations
on the surfaces with a certain periodicity.
24.3 Vaporization cutting

The vaporization cutting can be done on non metals like plastic, polymers or wood but also on metals. We can
use the previous model but in this case, since the material that must be removed has to to vaporized, ml will be
equal to 1. Again the process parameters that can be changed to reach the versatility of the process are the same
mentioned before.
116
In the following table there are some of the typical materials that are worked with laser with the mechanical
properties of the material but also the process properties such as the penetration speed (remember that it is not
the feed rate) and the interaction time. In particular note that it is required less time to vaporize the titanium with
respect to the aluminum, because of the absorption coefficient and the thermal diffusivity.
Figure 24.11: Typical materials workable and typical values of mechanical properties and process parameters.
We can express the penetration speed that appears in the previous picture through the MRR, in fact, remem-
bering that:
MRR = AP
/
ρ·(cp ·(Tf −Ta )+Lf +m ·Lf )
By calling V, the volume removed per unit time and per unit surface, we are considering just the penetration
speed or so called rate of separation:
V ·S = AP
/
ρ·(cp ·(Tf −Ta )+Lf +m ·Lf )
117
25 Laser cutting process and quality parameters
Typical process parameters:
• Beam properties:
– Power P , (Pulsed or Continuous)
– spot size ds
– wavelength
– mode (transfer electromagnetic mode, so the quality of the beam, how the power is distributed across
the surface of the beam)
– polarization (not so important in cutting applications but in other laser application it is)
• Transport properties:
– speed v, (transfer speed or speed rate, it is probably the most important variable because it influences
drmatically the quality of the cut but the economic of the cut)
– focal position hf
• Gas properties:
– nozzle position, shape, alignment
– gas composition (active or inert gas)
– jet velocity
• Material properties:
– optical
– thermal
Here just to remark that the transfer speed is the most important process variable: in function of the thickness of
the material, note that it can increase with the increase of power of by using an active gas when it is possible, but
when the thickness starts to increase too much there is no chance to make the process so fast.
Figure 25.1: Speed vs thickness: the inflence of using active gas and the influence of the incident power.
25.1 Spot size

We have said that by reducing the spot size we increase the power density of the laser beam and so the quality of
the cut can improve as it happened in the WJ. More over we are potentially increasing the depth of the laser cut
but of course there are limits (depth of field further on). More or less the diameter of the spot can be comparable
to the maximum diameter of the beam but it depends on the depth of field (the distance between the outlet of the
nozzle and the point of minimum diameter). So in summary it’s not always constant and it depends on what we
want to do: for example in the vaporization cutting the depth of field is in the order of magnitude of the material
thickness, but if we want to do keyhole cutting (that means with the formation of plasma) then the depth of field
is not important because the heat will be conducted through the plasma that is between the laser cutting head and
the material.
118
25.2 Focal position
The focal position is usually called hf . We can focus the beam exactly on the surface but it is very difficult,
for this reason, some laser cutting heads have an auto focus component which can vary automatically the focal
position in order to focus the beam on each point of the surface: this happens very frequently when we are working
surfaces that present some irregularities. For this reason it is preferable to have a negative focus, that means inside
the material in order to compensate most of the deviation or irregularities. So in most cases the focal position is
negative, exception for the reactive fusion cutting because, as we already said more and more times, here the power
is given by the oxidation.
25.3 Effect of gas jet velocity (pressure)

The maximum level of pressure is around 2 MPa but it is a very high value, typical only for very advanced cutting
heads and for high performance while in many other application we are with an order of magnitude less than this
maximum value and the reason is that if we exceed pressure we will observe a decrease of the possible cutting speed:
this saturation effect is due to, probably, the turbulence or the formation of shock waves, so mechanical waves
that propagate inside the gas and may interact with the laser velocity or get worse the quality of the beam.
Another theory is that there may be some clogging inside the head (between the lens and the nozzle): clogging
means that if we exceed in pressure of gas, the gas is not transparent to light anymore, that means refraction index
increase and so the velocity of the gas reduces and the quality of the beam reduces.
Figure 25.2: On the left a chart that shows the saturation effect of the cutting speed with the pressure of the gas
while on the right a picture that rapresents the presence of turbolence and shock penomena.
But on the contrary even if there may be this saturation effect, we need high pressure because we want the gas
remove the melted material, specially in melt and blow cutting and reactive fusion cutting while in other processes
it’s not so important like the welding processes. That’s why some companies have invented different systems for
increasing the pressure like the following one proposed by a japanese company (AMADA) in which are involved
two streams of gas: one inert at low pressure and one outer flow that restricts and cools down the gas and helps to
blow away the dross.
Figure 25.3: Solution developed by AMADA.
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25.4 Material properties
Talking about the material properties it’s important to remark the reflectivity. As we already said it influences the
MRR, we said that there are some tricks that can be used to improve the process (and so to decrease the reflectivity)
like painting the surface black of the material or make it more rough. As it is possible to see in the following table
we have a comparison between different surface: an untreated surface, so without any tricks, a surface that is shot
blasted in order to increase the surface roughness, and a polished surface just to see the differences. For a given
material and for constant power we can appreciate the differences just by looking at the cutting speed.
Figure 25.4: Effects of surface treatment on cutting speed.
So briefly, we can summarize the material properties that are important to understand how it is possible to act
in laser cutting:
• Optical properties, like reflectivity
• Thermal properties like the melting and vaporization temperature, but also the diffusivity
But then we have other properties of material that influence laser processability that are listed in the following
table. As it is possible to see we have to distinguish between high reflectivity metal, like alluminum, silver or gold,
medium reflectivity for most metals, in that case we distinguish the material depending on the melting temperature:
we find materials like crome or titanium, already mentioned, with high melting temperature,then material in the
cathegory of low melting temperature, like nichel or iron, and also high oxyde melting temperature, that are metals
that create problems during the reactive fusion cutting due to their high melting temperature.
Then we also find materials with low reflectivity that are the best material to be worked due to their tendency to
absorb more than the metals previously mentioned but there are some issues that affect these ones like the tendency
to char, specially for wood, rubber or wool and connected to this also the tendency to emit toxic fumes when they
char. In some cases there are also problems connected to the permanent smell that is released and affected the
materials that are worked, that means difficulties in selling.
Then we have also the tendency to crack for inorganic materials under thermal stresses.
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Figure 25.5: Behavior of different material to laser cutting: in particoular note the variability of reflectivity in
materials and the way they are usually classified.
25.5 Quality parameters

Talking about the quality we can obtain it is better to read the WJM cutting considerations about quality because
they are the same:
• The taper, measured as a difference in cutting width between one top measurement point and one bottom
measurement point, which are not the top and the bottom surfaces because of the roundness of the edges, so
it will be a little bit.
• Same considerations about roughness that can be measured in different ways like Rz parameter or Ra
parameter.
Figure 25.6: Roughness of the material: one of the main quality parameter.
But there are quality parameters that are not present in the quality of WJM cutting:
• the possible formations of bars, generally on the exit of the kerf, that are the drosses that re solidify ad
the exit depending on the melting point.
• the parameters that characterized the gas used to blow away the drosses;
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• the HAZ, so a region that is heat treated because of the laser process, which is a temper most of time, with
fast cooling, and it may be good or bad depending on the application (for example in welding it is bad because
we don’t want to have a large HAZ).
Figure 25.7: Roughness of the material: one of the main quality parameter.
What is real bad in laser is the possibility of cutting through multiple layers or multiple materials, that is
physically impossible due to the absorption of power, but also the investment cost that is relevant, specially high
power sources are expensive.
Figure 25.8: Comparison of different quality parameters.
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Figure 25.9: Comparison on kerfs realized by different techniques.
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26 Laser sources
26.1 Gas laser sources
They are the most used in industrial applications and also the first laser source that was invented was the CO2
source, with a typical wavelength of 10.6 µm.
• The mechanism of CO2 laser source is a vibrational source because actually the different energetic states are
not the individual energetic states of the atoms but of the molecule because CO2 is a gas. So the excitation
states are given to the molecules which vibrate in different ways according to energetic state. The molecules
have a 0 condition that is the equilibrium condition (e1), but, by giving sufficient vibrational energy, it is
possible to reach different conditions, for instance, looking at the scheme below, we can reach the so called
third mode (e4), in which the the molecules vibrate asymmetrically that is the higher energetic state, but
there are also two intermediate state, called e2 and e3, as shown below.
Figure 26.1: The energetic states of the CO2 molecules.
• The gas source is only made by 10% ofCO 2, while the rest of the gas composition is helium and nitrogen,
occupying more or less and respectively, 45% and 45%: that’s because the electric current cannot directly
excite the CO2 molecules.
The nitrogen absorbs the incoming energy from the electrical current then, simply by collisions, the N2 molecules
hit the CO2 molecules making them vibrate, that means that the CO 2 molecules jump directly from the ground
level to the excited level e4. So from this excited state the molecules, in a very short time, can only decay by
emitting photons (and so energy) either spontaneously or in a stimulated way: of course we have to maintain the
population inversion condition so we want that most of the molecules decay in a stimulated way. The first decay
from e4 to e3 will be the slowest one, because if not there wouldn’t be the population inversion,and here there will
be the emission of photons.
In order to calculate the wavelength and the frequency we just have to look at the amount of energy involved in
the state e3 and e4,so taking into account the difference between the energy of the fourth level and the third level
(the two values are shown in the previous picture), we have:
e4 = e3 + h · f43 --- f43 = e4−e3
h
c
λ · f = ν = c --- λ = f
(remember that h is the Planck’s constant) from which we could obtain the wavelength of the CO2source that
is:
λ= c
f43
= 10, 6µm
And also from this numbers we could calculate the quantum efficiency, which is rather large in this case and
it’s the ratio between the delta energy in the laser transmission and the delta energy between the excited level e4
and the ground level e1:
ηqCO2 = e4−e3
e4−e1 = 4,96−3,08
4,96 = 38%
But taking into account the overall process we have to consider also the loss of the deposit energy, the loss
during pumping and during the extraction, so it is possible to obtain a overall efficiency almost near to 10% (ηCO2 ).
From a construction point of view there are different CO2 laser typologies, so we can classify them in two
ways:
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1. According to the gas: we may have a sealed source which may be a tube or a slab (so a flat laser source), in
which the gas is always the same and remains inside until it is changed for maintenance, for example when
oxides deposit onto the electrode surfaces; or we may have a flowing gas (so continuous circulation of gas) and
can be classified as slow axial gas flow, fast axial gas flow , transverse gas flow (axial means that it has the
same direction of the electrical current, transverse means transverse to the electrode). Remember also that
in the second case, having a flowing gas means having a cooling medium because it cools down the source
during its circulation allowing larger power in fact the typical power of sealed sources is lower than the power
of flowing gas sources
2. According to the electromagnetic excitation, which may be axial or transverse.
26.1.1 Different CO2 laser design

1. The simplest design with an axial tube is the sealed tube CO2 source shown below. It is characterized by
an axial electromagnetic excitation because the two electrodes are placed near the two mirrors of the laser
source, and since this source is sealed we need to cool down it externally with an external heat exchange
system, which may be air cooling or water cooling.
Figure 26.2: Sealed tube CO2 on the left; on the right the typical parameters.
As it is possible to see the typical power is quite below 100W and so this allows limited power operations
(for instance marking,fusing, engraving), but it’s a compact design. Generally it works as a continuous source
but it may work also as a pulsed laser and about the quality, it is TEM 00, so it is a Gaussian beam.
2. Otherwise we can have the CO2 slab source: the excitation in this case is transverse because we have two
electrodes which are flat, they are two copper bars. Optionally one or both of the bars may be cooled down
with a cooling water, but sometimes it’s not necessary. Moreover the natural shape of the beam is rectangular,
so if we want to have a Gaussian beam we need some optics or beam shaping unit, in order to change the
source from rectangular shape to circular shape. Because of the better cooling we can increase the output
power range which can reach more or less 1000W and the typical application are pulsed welding or fine cutting
or drilling. The M 2 is not exactly one, it is a little bit more than one because it doesn’t grow as a cylindrical
beam.
Figure 26.3: On the left the CO2 slab source; on the right the typical parameters
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3. Another possible design is the CO2 Transverse Excited Atmospheric source in which we have a flowing
gas that starts to flow from an input point to the output point, and inside them the gas is excited in order
to have the emission. With respect to the mirrors the emission is axial but the electromagnetic excitation is
transverse. Here below is shown the typical design with the typical parameters.
Figure 26.4: On the left the CO2 Transverse Excited Atmospheric source; on the right the typical parameters
26.2 Solid-state laser sources

The nd:YAG (Doped Yttrium Aluminum Garnet) is the most common solid state source. It’s like a rod with a
good thermal stability. As we said for the gas source it is possible to calculate the wavelength of this source and the
quantum efficiency knowing where exactly the laser emission happens and the energy level involved. In the scheme
below it is shown that the levels we are interested to are e2 and e3.
Figure 26.5: The energetic state of the YAG source.
So again we could obtain:

e3 = e2 + h · f32 --- f32 = e3−e2
h
λ · f = ν = c --- λ = c
f32
= 1, 064 · 10−6m
λNd:Y AG = c
22,69−3,98
e3−e2 = = 49%
ηqNd:Y AG = 36
e4−e1
Comparing the CO2source and the Nd:YAG source in terms of efficiency, the last one has a quantum efficiency
which is higher than the first one while the overall efficiency depends on the way of pumping but however we can
say that the overall efficiency is less or almost 10% (ηNd:Y AG ≈ 5% in case of lamp pumping; ηNd:Y AG ≈ 10% in
case of diode pumping).
In the scheme below it represented the lamp pumped Nd:YAG source. It is possible to see a crystal and
transparent rod ( typical value of the length is 200 mm with a diameter Φ15mm) which is optically pumped by
an external light (lamp), that can be xenon, mercury or krypton flash light. One problem with the laser sources,
specially with YAG sources is that if we increase the power the crystal rod will deform because of heating and the
deformations might increase the value of M 2decreasing the quality of the beam, that’s why we usually need an heat
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exchange in order to cool down the rod.
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Figure 26.6: Lamp pumped Nd:YAG sources.
In the figure 26.6 we can see also the reflectors with an elliptical shape. If we use just one reflector, the lamp
is placed at one of the two focus of the ellipse, while at the other one it is placed the rod. In the previous image
we have a symmetrical option with two reflectors, so in the two symmetric focus we place the lamps while on the
common focus it is placed the rod. Moreover since the laser generation is axial, we can connect more rod axially so
to have a modular machine.
Remember that the pumping can be optical that means we can have lamps or another laser (we use a laser to
pump a laser). This second option is usually realized through a diode laser and used when we have fiber: so we
pumped from a diode laser, we convey the laser inside a fiber which will pump another laser, typically a Nd:YAG
laser source.
Figure 26.7: Diode pumped Nd:YAG laser

The effect of the distortion of the rod caused by heating is called thermal lensing: if originally we have
a cylindrical shape of the rod, the distortion will be such that the center of the crystal will be hotter than the
periphery, so the dilatation of the material will be higher in the center than in the periphery and the outer profile
of the rod will be curved. It’s a big problem because ideally we have one unique length and the lenses are sold
according to the focal distance, but the focal distance is proportional to the power in this case, because with an
increase of power the distortion increases that means less quality of the beam and a larger beam divergence. The
focal distance is always a data but it is valid for cylindrical beam, but due to the fact that now we don’t have a
cylindrical beam, the focal distance will change obviously. This is why in the diode pumping, which is cooler
that the lamp pumping, we have less thermal lensing, less distortion and a better BPP (beam parameter product).
Figure 26.8: Thermal lensing.
26.2.1 Fiber laser

The other option, instead of using a rod, is to use a fiber. The difference is related only to the diameter because
with a further reduction of the diameter we are talking about wires and not rods. and the problem now is to
generate and transmit the laser inside the wire, for this reason we usually talk about fiber lasers.
The fiber lasers are very used nowadays, and the material used as a medium can be the same as in the Nd:YAG,
or other material like erbium, ytterbium or thulium. As it is possible to see in the following image we have a bunch
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of fibers that convey into one unique fiber that transmits the light. Each one of the fiber that conveys into one
point may come from different sources, then we have our active length of the fiber which works as the resonator
cavity. The pumping is axial through the fiber itself and all the laser beam remains inside entrapped (the reason
will be clarified then) because the periphery of the fiber works as the mirror during the transmission. The other
mirrors that reflects the light are realized by laser processing and consist in some details inside the fiber which are
called “Bragg grating” , so scrabs that are able to reflect the light.
Figure 26.9: Fiber active laser source.
Again if we have heating of the fiber and so the thermal lensing, the Bragg grating will delete and this
delatation will change the wavelength of the light that comes out.
A typical combination may be the Diode Pumped Solid State Laser (DPSSL) which has a very high efficiency
(30%-40%) in which a diode laser can optically excite the active medium (solid) directly or through an optical fiber.
This combination is used not only for its high efficiency, but also for the low thermal load that means low thermal
lensing and so higher beam quality, and for the maintenance which is lower than other industrial options.
Talking about the delivery system we can convey the light through reflective mirrors (the laser travels simply in
air) or with fibers, which are not used only for generating the laser (as happens in the laser fiber sources) but also
to transmit the beam itself. Using fibers allows us to have more flexibility without any alignment problems that
may occur with simple reflective mirrors: the fibers can be bent but not too much because otherwise the light may
escape from the core of the fiber, that is related to a variation of the incident angle of the beam that travels inside.
But except for this limitation the fibers are more convenient because with mirrors the laser source does not move,
so it is stationary and table moves, only for small regions that must be worked it happens that the laser source
moves.
Figure 26.10: Beam delivery systems.
In order to understand what happens inside the fiber and how the delivery fiber system works let’s consider the
following picture:
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Figure 26.11: Fiber optics: inside the fiber.
The blue lines represents the laser beam that arrives at the surface with a certain incident angle with respect
to the normal of the surface, called ϑi, while part of the energy is reflected following the angle ϑr ( which is equal
to ϑi) and part of the energy which is transmitted with the angle ϑt(which is different from ϑi). But here it’s
the opposite situation with respect to the laser cutting, in fact we want the coefficient of absorption equal to 0
because if there is some kind of absorption, we are loosing energy, that means that in the worst case ϑtis equal to
◦
90 and in this case the beam remains inside the fiber. The medium 1 is the fiber glass while the medium 2 is air.
Any transparent medium is characterized by a number which is called refractivity index (n) and for convention the
refractivity index of air is equal to one, while any other medium is referred indirectly to air because if 2 is air we can
use the Snell law which relates the speed travel velocity in the medium (in air in our case) with the speed velocity
in any other medium. So the refractivity index just tells us how much the light will slow down when it enters in
another medium different from air: that means that with air the light can reach the maximum speed with respect
to the other material in which obviously will decrease.
sinϑi
sinϑt
= sinϑ1
sinϑ2
= v1
v2
= n2
n1
◦
If we want ϑt equal to 90 we can substitute and calculate the value of ϑi = ϑc (critical angle) in this case:
sinϑi = sinϑi = n2 sinϑ = n2
n1 ---
sinϑt sin90° c n1
Above this angle we will have for sure some loss in the second medium. For instance if we consider a fiber glass
with a refractivity index n1 = 1, 5 and the medium 2 with n2 = 1 we can obtain ϑc = 46◦.
Figure 26.12: The importance of the critical angle.
The problem now is that the fiber glass is not in the direct contact with air but it is coated by a layer of plastic:
the interface is not fiber glass and air but we have fiber glass and cladding as we can see in the next picture:
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Figure 26.13: Core and cladding.
The real fibers have a onion structure: the core is a glass layer which transmits the light, then we have another
glass layer, which is used to keep the core clean, and then a plastic cladding in order to protect the first two layers
from the outside. The Snell law is however valid but the critical angle we previously obtained is not valid anymore
since the interface is now changed. It’s important to avoid the formation of dirt between the two glass layer because
if it happens, here, at the speck of dirt the light will be absorbed and refracted in all directions. By using the Snell
law and the previous analysis, with ncore = n1 = 1, 5 and ncladd = n2 = 1, 48 we can obtain ϑ c= 80,6° which is the
typical value for this kind of optical fiber.
Figure 26.14: The fiber glass and the cone of acceptance.
Here it is reported a comparison between the BPP and the power output, showing that with the increase of
power, we decrease the quality of the beam and so the BPP increases.
Figure 26.15: BPP vs power.
26.2.2 beam focusing systems

Talking about the beam focusing systems, in our laser experience we have seen different way of using the lenses: in
some cases we need reflective mirrors, for example in the laser sources or in the transmission of the laser itself, in
other cases, specially with laser cutting, we need transmissive lenses placed inside the laser cutting head. We have
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Figure 26.17: Depth of field.
already said also that with the focusing lens we focus on the spot size (generally zero or negative), in order to have
the minimum diameter inside the surface or at least on the surface.
The lenses are sold with a given focal length f, (not the frequency), but in the optical terminology we recall
also the waist diameter, d0,which is the minimum diameter and it’s not necessarily the spot diameter ds. These
two diameters are the same if only the focal height hf is equal to 0.
Figure 26.16: Optical terminology.
The reason why the minimum diameter is not 0 is called “spherical aberration”: it is such that rays at the outer
periphery of the focusing lens will be focused at a different focal distance with respect to the rays at the center of
the focusing lens. This kind of phenomenon happens also with the divergence of the beam, so when the beam is
not perfectly cylindrical. This leads to a power distribution which not only will be larger at the cross section but
it will also be distributed in the axial direction because we will have axially different focal points.
So if we want to be more precise it is better not to use the ideal focal length given by the producer, but the actual
focal position , which depends on the incident beam. Moreover remember that if we use a diameter which is a little
higher or lower than d0, this is for sure higher than d 0, and remembering that the power density is proportional
with the inverse of the spot diameter, it occurs a reduction in the power density, we should place a limit above
which it’s better not to make the laser process because we have to low power density. Conventionally we fix the
value of the diameter proportional to the waist diameter:
d∗ = 1, 41 · d0
So finally we have a criterion to define the depth of field (profondità di campo):
√
∆zpdc = |zpdc − z0| = h2 − 1 · dθ0
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27 Laser welding
The applications of laser depends on the combination of power density, in terms of relationship between power and
spot size focus, and the interaction time;τ can be considered as the pulse duration in case of pulse laser (and so
interpreted as the laser pulsing) or as the result of the continuous travel over a surface in which it is the ratio
between the spot size and the transfer speed.
Figure 27.1: Laser applications map: power density vs. interaction time.
As illustrated in figure 27.1, changing these 2 parameters, we obtain different applications. Traditional applica-
tions of laser are performed with a relatively long interaction time and we can have cutting (with an average power
W
of 106 2 ) or welding, obtained in the same power range increasing a little bit the time.
cm
Fo
cusing on welding, there are 2 different kinds of it:
• Keyhole (or deep penetration) welding: it goes very deep inside the material because the formation of the
plasma column modifies the way that heat is conducted and will prefer vertical direction respect to the radial.
So we obtain shape factor that is very excellent and we have a nail without a lateral transition.
• Conduction welding.
W W
We can pass from one type of welding to another changing the power density I 2
; if we go over 106 2 , the
cm cm
shape of the beam dramatically changes. As illustrated in fig.27.2:
• with low power density, case on the left, we have semi-spherical pool;
• when we go in excess of 106, we can observe channel, called also keyhole.
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Figure 27.2: Critical limit between conduction and keyhole welding.
Notice that power density is the most important factor (more the interaction time) in order to identify the
different types of welding, as shown in the table below.
W
Process Heat Source Intensity Fusion zone profile
m2
Flux/Gas shielded Arc Welding 5 ∗ 106 − 108
Plasma 5 ∗ 106 − 1010
Laser (o electron beam) 1010 − 1012
Table 4: Relative Power densities of different welding processes.
It is possible to see that plasma arc welding or gas arc welding, respect to other technologies, has a lower power
density and as a consequence, the shape of the seals are larger; in some cases, they are more larger than the beep
and this is bad for the quality and the strength of the welding seal.
In conclusion, laser is the only technology that can achieve an “arrow” welding channel and this aspects cor-
responds to have a negligible heat affected zone (HAZ) that no other welding technologies can obtain; this is the
reason why laser welding is considered the best quality welding technology, especially keyhole welding.
27.1 General equipment

The equipment of laser welding head is very similar to laser cutting head.
There are main two differences, both related to the gas:
1. The most important is that we do not have a nozzle that purposes gas acceleration (contrary to the laser
cutting head). In fact, we don’t want that the gas is accelerated because we don’t want that the melt will be
expelled from the bottom of the kerf.
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2. The gas feeding sometimes can be outside the laser head (as shown in case B of figure27.3).
Sometimes there is also an additional shrouding protecting gas even from below the welding connection (not only
from the top).
Figure 27.3: Two general equipment for laser welding.
Another difference is that, in laser welding, the gas not only protects the lens but protects also the seal from
oxidation that represents the biggest enemy of welding; in fact, oxygen can be the cause of a porous and less
resistant weld bead. The only method to avoid this risk is to take oxygen away; so our gas can not be rich by
oxygen.
An additional difference is that when we have to joint two sheets (operation called butt joint), as in case A of
figure27.3, we must have two clamping features that work as positioning elements; these have to position in the
correct place the sheets in order to have a very precise process. Furthermore, in case of keyhole welding, we don’t
want to exceed the depth of field and so we have to precisely control also the vertical position (not only the axial).
Notice that this positioning problem is the most important problem in laser welding; in fact, it is a great
technology but it becomes expensive and difficult to handle because we must be very precise in positioning the
workpiece. For this reason, it isn’t a very productive technology.
Finally, an important properties is that, respect to other welding techniques, in laser welding we don’t have
additional material and so there isn’t a significantly volume build up. In fact, during the process, we melt only the
material that already belong to the sheets.
27.2 Conduction welding

W
Laser welding technology that uses a power density on the spot around or below 106
cm2 is called conduction
welding. Since we are below this power density threshold, the material melts and eventually vaporizes more slowly
and so there is the time to form isothermal curves that look a lot like the curves of a normal thermal conduction
model, plotted through numerical methods, applying heat equation. So, the material can be consider homogeneous
with constant parameters with the shape of isothermal curves, illustrated in figure 27.4, that are generated with an
incident beam.
When the temperature goes in excess of the melting temperature, welt region from the hitting point starts to
propagate inside the material and we have a region of melting material, called weld pool, that replicates exactly the
shape of the material curve.
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Figure 27.4: Conduction welding scheme and its diffusion heat process inside the workpiece.
Looking to the 3-dimensional scheme of laser welding, as shown in the previous figure, we can see that the focus
laser beam moves in x-direction, that is our transfer direction, with speed v and in case we consider the cross section
based on xz-plane, we have a cross section no more symmetric. As the faster the beam goes, the more asymmetric
will be the melting pool of this cross section. As a consequence, there will be a “trail” of melting material which is
left behind the laser beam and it takes some times to cool down that we want that is short.
In order to reduce this time, the shrouding gas has an important role: this protecting gas not only has to protect
the region exactly around the beam, but, since the melting region is significantly larger then the beam, there will
be a cloud all around the beam that protects the process.
Figure 27.5: Welding shape curves with different transfer speed.
In figure 27.5, we can see the curves obtaining using the same power and changing the transfer speed from 15 to
mm
35 . We can observe that the morphological shape is the same but the aspect ratio (larger or smaller) changes.
s
This means that, by changing the welding speed, i change the interaction time τ but i am not able to change the
conduction welding mechanism. Note that if i go too fast, i don’t have welding at all or the dimensions of the sim
are so small that i cannot made a significant weld that is strong enough to bond the two sheets together. So, this
confirm the fact that this phenomena is governed by the power density I and not by the interaction time τ .
As we have seen, the main problem in conduction welding is that the dimension of the melting seam is
significantly larger than the spot size (comparable in dimension to the typical seal of arc welding). Since the duty
of laser welding is to have a seam very small, almost invisible, we can’t use conduction welding but we need to
increase the inlet power, focusing in a better way the laser beam and trigger to another mechanism called keyhole.
27.3 Keyhole welding

In keyhole welding (also called deep penetration), we increase the power density and so the material rapidly melts
and generates vapor; then, the heated vapor generates plasma inside the colon (as illustrated in figure 27.6) and so
the coefficient of heat conduction change completely and so heat equation doesn’t have sense anymore.
Experience says that the transmission of the heat is favorite in the axial direction; as a consequence, the laser is
better absorbed in this direction and so the plasma channel will go vertically. So, due to this phenomena, the size
of the welding seam is comparable to the size of the laser beam.
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Figure 27.6: Keyhole welding scheme.
Another consequence, that we can see in 3D-representation, is that there are less asymmetrical shapes of cross
section. In fact, since also horizontal dimension is smaller, in both direction there will be symmetry and so we
can go faster then using conduction welding (that is another advantage then the previous case).
Amazing aspect ratio is another advantage using keyhole welding, that it can be observed from the micrography
in figure 27.7. We can notice that the seam is not perfectly invisible and there is a little build up that depends
on the speed. In fact, it means that in this region the density of the material decreases a little and there is also a
depression region due to a too fluid material (probably we can have also some bulging below). Additionally, we can
also observe the beginning of some dendrites formation.
Figure 27.7: Keyhole micrography.
Note that, as told before, there is no additional material.
27.4 Process parameters

Operating parameters of laser welding are very similar to what already said for laser cutting (discussed in chapter
25 ). In fact, as we have already said in laser cutting, also for welding exist the relations:
P
= cost
t·w·v
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Figure 27.8: Typical operating quantity.
The only differences are respect to joint geometries (T-joint, butt joint, ...) and gap tolerances (i.e. gap limit);
in fact, in case of butt joint, the two sheets will be difficult to have the surfaces perfectly flat and parallel and so
there will be some gap due to this not continuous contact.
Some of this gap is beneficial because helps laser go through and also below the surfaces but we cannot exceed
of course because, if we too much gap, we don’t have welding process. Notice that, in order to have a good quality
of the weld bead, it is important also to analyze the laser beam properties, the welding speed, the focal position
and the shroud gas properties that will be discussed in the next paragraphs.
Figure 27.9: Example of operating characteristics of square weld.
27.4.1 Laser beam wavelength

We can have different sources for laser beam, with different wavelengths, that affects welding properties:
• CO 2 laser: this source can only work with keyhole welding; in conduction welding, the power used is lower
and the absorption coefficient is very small at solid state; so, in this case we can only work with CO 2 lasers
only if we can power high enough to rapidly remove the solid material and get to the vapor because it can
be absorbed only by very hot material (and this condition makes quite impossible their usage in conduction
welding). They are cost efficient but generate a welding seam with the smaller dimension and so the smaller
HAZ (and so the better quality).
• Nd:YAG/fiber laser: they have much power then diodes (1-3 kW ); usually, with this laser we obtain high
quality welding seams. They can also perform micro or pulsed welding
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• Laser diode: they have a lower wavelength and so the light can be absorbed also at the solid state; they
are used only for conduction welding because they have generally low power. Notice that they have also low
thickness.
Figure 27.10: Example of laser diodes.
Note that laser wavelength has a limited effects (not so important) on keyhole welding since it has an high
absorption factor.
27.4.2 Welding speed
Figure 27.11: Relationship between welding speed, beam quality a) and penetration depth b) .
During laser welding, if we increase the speed, we don’t change the mechanism (in figure 27.11 we have always
keyhole welding), but we decrease the penetration depth and the dimension of the weld bead.
On the contrary, considering the power, if we increase it, we obtain more penetration depth. Notice that, if we
decrease the velocity, we m
So, if we want to weld thin sheets, for example below 5 mm, we can go very fast (also 8 as shown in fig.27.12)
min
and it is high productive. Note that in figure below, the spot size is very small (ds = 330 µm ) in order to achieve,
with a high power laser, a very high power density.
Figure 27.12: Penetration test of stainless steel with a very high power laser (8 kW fiber laser).
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According to different speed conditions, we can have some defects (illustrated in fig.27.1343) :
• Drop out: it occurs when we have low value of v and too high power. The molten puddle is attracted to the
bottom of the workpiece by the gravity
• Undercut: in case of too high welding speed, we can have undercut of the workpiece;
• Humping: using a too high speed and power, we can have both undercut and also porosity.
Figure 27.13: Speed defects.
27.4.3 Focal position

As we said for laser cutting operation, focal distance must be controlled very well because the spot size represents
a critical parameter in relation to the quality. For example, if we have an undulation of our sheet, this will change
the distance of the focal position from the lens and it will change dramatically the power. In order to avoid this
problem, we must be sure that the focal position is within the depth of field.
Typically, in laser welding, it is preferred to work with a negative focus44 that is a little bit more robustness
respect to little changes in focal distance; on the other hand, is more dangerous to work with positive focus because
less energy goes into the material and may occur that it isn’t enough to activate keyhole welding.
Figure 27.14: Depth field determination through experimental test.
In order to find the correct depth of field, some experimental tests can be done in which it will be observed
where keyhole welding occurs on a sloping plane; using the focal position dependency on the depth of field, we can
found the technological depth of field zpdc,tech according to where the keyhole starts (xin) and finishes (xout):
∆zpdc,tech = |xin − xout| sinθ

43
Speed defects part is not discussed during the lesson.
44Focus is not on the top of the surface but inside the material.
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27.4.4 Joint geometries
Joint geometry represents a very important factor and the variety of kinds of geometry represents a strong advan-
tage respect to arc welding; since don’t have to add material, we don’t need to prepare the butt or the weld seam.
Vice versa, in conventional welding, we have to prepare the sheets through chamfer (i.e. trim the edges) in order
to enlarge the region in which feed the additional material. As a consequence, through this safe of material (and
also on speed), laser welding is not necessarily more expensive than conventional arc welding.
Figure 27.15: Examples of joint geometries.
In advance, another advantage is that, in some configurations, laser welding is the only option: for example, in
an extreme case, as kissing or flare weld illustrates in fig.27.15, it use laser welding due to the difficulty to achieve
the correct weld point. Most frequent and easy combinations are the butt joint or the lap weld, where the two
sheets are overlap.
Another option is remote laser welding: it works with a very large focal distance and it is advantage when it is
difficult to access to the material or in case of very large structure (for example, in automotive).
Notice that with coated steel sheets, laser welding is a little more tricky because we don’t have only a keyhole
on the base metal but we have also a region of vaporize zinc (oxide zinc used for example to coat in automotive
application) that is complicate to be handle. So, during butt joint or lap joint, a gap between the two coated steel
sheets is essential in order to let the zinc vapor evacuate and so do not form bubbles inside the material.
27.4.5 Gap
In laser welding we don’t have only a negative focus but we apply a gap45; this option allows the focus to be more
negative and to go deeper inside the material. The gap is a little bit less than 15% of the welding sheet thickness
(gap limit) and depends on the spot size.
Figure 27.16: Gap during Butt joint.

45Remember that ,in any case, there is some gap due to not perfect tolerances of the workpiece surfaces.
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27.4.6 Shroud gas properties
The purposes of the gas are:
• to protect the lens;

• to shroud the region and so protect this region from oxidation that can modify the quality of the process;
• to blow away the plasma which is been vaporized and placed between the ray and the seam (not blow away
the plasma from the channel). In this region, the plasma creates a region where refraction takes place (a sort
of plasma cloud as shown in fig.27.17) and this significantly reduces the intensity of the beam that goes to
the surface.
Figure 27.17: Plasma cloud generated that has to be blown away.
According to plasma cloud problem, the best shroud gases don’t easily transform themselves in to plasma46
because what that must become plasma is the material.
Gas characterized by high ionization is transparent and it is a good property but, on the other hand, the
drawback is that it is very expensive. Some examples of shroud gases are shown in the table below:
Material 1stIonization Potential, eV

Helium 24,46
Argon 15,68
Neon 15,54
Carbon dioxide 14,41
Water vapor 12,56
Aluminum (as metal example) 5,96
Table 5: Ionization Potential of common gases.
In the industries, argon is the most typical choice even if, since it has an ionization potential lower than helium,
it tends much easily to form plasma, with negative effects on the penetration. On the contrary, helium costs very
much respect to argon and it has also the problem that is more lightweight respect air and it tends to go up into
the atmosphere leave the joint more exposed to air and so the gas doesn’t correctly protect it.
46Remember that plasma is a gas which is ionized and at high temperature.
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27.5 Comparison
Figure 27.18: Summary on some benefits and characteristics of laser welding.
Figure 27.19: Comparison between different welding technologies.
Fig.27.19 illustrates a comparison with other welding technology; note that the useful comparison is between laser
and TIG47 (typical arc welding good quality) that is the competitor, while it is useless to compare laser to ultrasonic
welding because it is spot welding while the advantage of laser comes out with continuous welding technique. The
most relevant key-points are now showed:
• Laser is faster (better rate) and have lower heat input respect TIG since it uses a very high amount of power
but applied in a short time.
• Laser has a narrow HAZ as a consequence of this lower heat input.
• Better weld bead appearance since sometimes is invisible respect TIG.
• Not simple fixturing for laser since we have to be sure about focus distance.
• Laser and TIG have same reliability.

47Tungsten inert gas: it use an electrode made of tungsten and a flow of inert gas around it that creates an arc between the substrate
material that we want to melt and the electrode itself.
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• TIG sometimes is preferred to be submerged and it is used for reflective materials that we can’t work with
laser.
Notice that we couldn’t have fume with laser but lasers are more dangerous to be treated (more intense protection
of human operations).
About the costs48, operating costs depend on direct variable costs that are related to process parameters.
In the figure 27.20, the gray column (Depr.& Interest) is related to the equipment cost that is a direct cost
related to the machine that is bought. To have cost optimization, we must operating on other costs that considers
replacement parts (and so wear rate), consumption of electrical power, maintenance of the sources and also gas
usage (it represents an important cost). Floor space it must be taken in account not for an operating point of view
but to consider if the technology can be installed.
Figure 27.20: Example of operating costs comparison.

€
In the picture costs are considered related to time; in case we consider, for example, the costs in terms of ,
m
we must also take in account the speed. Notice that this diagram is not so true because based on the application,
operating costs can vary.
48Very important for Strano since without a reasonable cost estimation, technological process doesn’t make sense.
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28 Other laser applications
28.1 Laser marking
Laser marking is a very compact and extremely fast technology; it uses mirrors and works on a small region (for
example the write a letter, as illustrated in fig.27.20). Mirrors are useful in this application since we use a small
wavelength laser that works on a small region and than can move the laser beam to the target position.
The system is composed by a galvo49 scan: it is used to change the position of two mirrors in order to scan or
direct the laser into different direction, by changing x or y position.
Figure 28.1: Example of laser marking system.
In this process, one problem occurs due the fact that the ray is no more orthogonal to the surface; but, since
the surface is small enough, a little inclination is not a big problem according to absorption since it doesn’t reduce
it (it might increases due to surface roughness). On the contrary, a problem occurs in terms of spot size: if the ray
has a little bit inclination, spot size changes since there isn’t no more a circle mark but an oval mark is obtained
on the sheet at the intersection between the surface and the ray.
28.2 Laser hardening

Laser hardening is a laser operation that in general uses in heat treatments in order to hardening the material.
The type of mechanism is very similar to conduction welding but, in this case, melting temperature is not achieve;
temperature achieve is around or below31 Tmelting according to the heat treatment process that it must be performed.
Figure 28.2: Scheme of laser hardening process.
The main problem with heat treatments is that the high power of laser is generally obtain and focused in a very
arrow region that in laser hardening case isn’t an advantage anymore.
In fact, the typical aim of hardening process is to treat the entire surface and so, in this case, laser might be
inefficient; but, in the situation in which it is used just for small details (for example, the contact zone of a gear
49Galvo: it is a high-resolution rotary motor with a mirror mounted on.
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tooth as showed in fig.28.3), it makes sense. So, in case is needed a local heat treatment, laser welding is a smart
idea (probably one of the few options).
Figure 28.3: Cross section of a gear tooth in C45 carbon steel hardened by CO2 laser.
28.3 Laser cladding

Laser cladding is an application of laser welding used for repairing (for example, to locally repair fatigue fracture)
or coating purposes. There are two different system option (illustrated in fig.28.4) according to which is the process
in which the technology is applied:
Figure 28.4: Scheme of two different laser cladding heads.
1. Powder cladding: this application is particularly used in maintenance; it is excellency applied for locally
repair operation while it isn’t a good technology for large surface applications. The schematic of laser cladding
head looks a lot as a welding head but, in this case, there is an addition of metal powder into the injected
gas; this powder melts in the head by the laser beam and it is projected to the surface by the gas. When it
hits the surface, powder instantaneously solidifies in order to fill the crack (they melt with the base). Notice
that the powder must be made of the same material of the repaired workpiece.
2. Wire cladding: it is used for coating operations on larger surface respect powder cladding with an higher
speed (powder cladding is slower since the low amount of powder per minute that we can melt). In wire laser
cladding, option B of the figure below, laser beam is applied to melt material added by a wire (or a stick).
This operation, as said, is faster than with powder and lets to increase the productivity, since we have more
volume material added per minute and we increase the material deposition rate (i.e. higher build up rate). In
this case, the material melt is different from the base material: the purpose of coating is to coat with a noble
material a substrate made by a less noble material in order to increase the hardness of the workpiece.
In both cases, there is the problem of surface tolerance (i.e. surface roughness): it is worse respect previous
applications and since we add new material, the surface has to be grinded and polished again.
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Powder Wire
Purpose Repair Coat
Geometrical tolerance ↑more precise ↓
Surface quality ∼ ∼(maybe a bit↑related to noble wire material)
Productivity ↓ ↑
Dimension of worked surface locally operation ↓ ↑
Table 6: Comparison between powder and wire cladding
In addition, especially for the wire, there is a problem related to the geometrical tolerances: since the build
up rate is increased, we added more material per unit time and so the filled metal can have some distortions. On
the contrary, in laser powder classing, the deposited layer is thinner since we are feeding particle by particle and
therefor, it is more precise (even if it is small). As a consequence, in terms of geometrical precision, powder is much
better than wire cladding.
28.3.1 Additive manufacturing

Nowadays, respect to the past, DED (directed energy deposition) additive manufacturing processes substitutes laser
cladding. DED additive manufacturing technologies used heated powder or wire and can do cladding by layers and
creates a 3D-shape layer by layer. The idea of this application is that we can add material to an existing part to
create strange shape that can’t be done by forging (due to undercuts) or conventional machines. This topic will be
discussed with more details in part IX in which additive manufacturing technologies are discussed
Figure 28.5: Example of additive manufacturing machine tool.
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Part VII
Plasma Arc Cutting
29 Introduction
29.1 Plasmas’ properties
Plasma arc cutting or PAC is a thermal material removal process that is primarily used for cutting thick
sections of electrically conductive materials, through, of corse, the use of plasma.
Plasma: the fourth state of matter
Figure 29.1: States of matter.
A state of matter is one of the distinct forms that matter takes on, four states of matter are observable: solid,
liquid, gas, and plasma; they are classified according to an ascending order of energy content.
Plasma can be reached by giving additional energy to a gas, which, meeting ionization, profoundly modifies its
physical properties, becoming a conductor of electricity: the molecules of a gas at very high temperature are
divided into atoms which compose them, and if temperature further increases some electrons leave the atom,
making it ionized becoming an conductor of electricity.
Plasma is therefore defined as: an electrically neutral medium of unbound positive (ions) and negative (electrons)
particles (i.e. the overall charge of a plasma is roughly zero).
It is good to remark that a weakly ionized gas is not plasma, in fact a gas in order to be plasma requires:
• High levels of energy density which depends on the spatial density of charges and temperature
• Conditions of electrical neutrality macroscopic
29.1.1 Debye Length

As seen in the previous box, the overall charge of plasma is equal to zero (while microscopically there’s a certain
charge); considering a positive nucleus, the distance at which the overall electric field is zero-value is called Debye
Length λD:
Figure 29.2: Debye Length.
148
this sphere can be seen as an independent neutral particle; Debye Length is proportional to:
kB T
λD∝
n
where:
2
• kB = 1.38 × 10−23 kg · m is the Boltzmann’s constant;
s2 · K
• T is the temperature of the plasma;
• n represents the electrical charge density: not all particles are charged, some of them might be already ionized
and some might be not ionized at all, because of that it’s important to know the number of ionized molecules
instead of the generic number of molecules.
Another characteristic of plasma, is that it can be shaped by an electromagnetic field: the beam can be controlled
without mechanical methods (such as nozzles); this is an advantage as because of high temperatures related to
plasma, the majority of materials available would melt and evaporate.
29.1.2 Electromagnetic properties of plasmas

One can estimate the density of particles multiplying the density of the gas times α, which is the fraction of
ionized particles (that is a function of temperature and ionization potential of the gas), its S-shape is well
represented in Figure 29.3:
Figure 29.3: Fraction of ionized particles.
when temperature increases, the number of charged particles increases as well.

After the vertical portion of the S-shape curve there can be identified a fraction at which the amount of charged
particles is sufficient to start the technological operation.
High fractions of ionized particles are required, because this is what really allows arcs formation: no ionized gas
(no plasma) means there’s no channel for current flow, therefore no arcs ⇒the higher the ionized gas the higher
the current.
The electrical conductivity is responsible for:
1. If the plasma is forced to reduce the useful section of the passage of electric current, acting as a conductor,
increasing the energy generated by the Joule effect.
• Sensitivity to magnetic fields: this peculiarity of the state of plasma, which is widely exploited in
the field of production of electrical energy for the confinement of the hot core of nuclear reactors, leads
to the possibility of varying the direction of motion of charged particles in the plasma.
2. Plasma acts as a metal for the current transport. A metal is suitable to be the anode for the plasma generation.
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29.1.3 Electric discharge regimes
As an order of magnitude PAC operates at around 100A (as in point J, Figure 29.4):
Figure 29.4: Electric discharge regimes.
The previous diagram is in logarithmic scale, before reaching this amount of current50, it all begins with a
neutral gas (Point A), which starts to be ionized.
Remark 6. The more the gas is ionized the higher the current which can pass through.
Before arcs formation there’s “pre-arc phase” when gas starts glowing, the same experience one gets trying
to turn on a neon light: it glows at first and then becomes bright. Looking again at the diagram in Figure 29.4,
glowing phase occurs with low current, because gas is not ionized enough yet, so there’s no chance for a stable arc
to exist.
There are two breakdown voltages (Point E and Point H): this means that before those points the medium
acts like a dielectric (not electrically conductive) and breaking it down (raising voltage) it becomes electrically
conductive.
Remark 7. Once reached Point J arcs are stabilized, electrical resistance becomes lower while ionized fraction is
higher which means low voltage required.
Finally there are two situations:
1. when the arc starts to appear;
2. when the arc is stabilized and the technological operation can starts;
this is why there are two different generators:
• Pilot System (usually operating in AC): it generates the so-called pilot arc, aimed to reach the breakdown
voltage starting ionizing the gas.
• a second generator at lower voltage (usually operating in DC), used when the arc is already stabilized (Point
J).
29.2 Classification of plasmas

Plasmas represent the 99% of the whole matter present in the Universe, a great amount of phenomena surrounding
us are related to plasma, like lightnings and aurora borealis (respectively at low and high pressure51).
Plasmas are classified by temperature and density of electrons (as shown in Figure 29.5).
50
Remembering that this is possible just with the right amount of ionized particles.
51Pressure
influences brightness, temperature and energy of plasma itself.
150
Electronvolt eV
It is a unit of energy, it represents the amount of energy associated to the charge of a single electron moving across
an electric potential difference of 1V :
19 J
1 eV = qV = 1.6 × 10−19 C · 1V = 1.6 × 10− C · 1 = 1.6 × 10−19J
C
where q = 1.6 × 10−19C is the electric charge of an electron; electronvolts can be related to the temperature
through the Boltzmann constant obtaining:
1 eV ≈ 7740K
Figure 29.5: Plasma classification.

PAC technology is set in the region defined by the black circle in Figure 29.5, so λD = 10−6 ÷ 10−4.
Remark 8. There can be even cold plasmas, at low density and low temperature.
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30 Plasma torch
The torch is that part of the system which allows arcs formation, the arc is generated between two electrodes that
change depending on the operating circuit:
• Pilot system: usually at the beginning of the operation as the distance is small current can easily flows; in
this case the two electrodes are:
– the electrode inside the torch;

– the torch itself;
arcs are therefore produced inside the torch.

• Low voltage circuit: during the operation the two electrodes are:
– the electrode inside the torch;
– the material to be worked itself.
Remark 9. Having arcs inside the torch wears out the torch itself, so usually it is preferable to operate in continuity
in order to not turn on and off the torch.
Remark 10. Sometimes electrodes can have an insert on their tips, made of an more conductive material (such as
zirconium or hafnium oxide) increasing the emission without having an electrode entirely made of more expensive
materials.
Figure 30.1: Torch scheme.
The use of the two circuits are related to two different configurations, as Figure 30.2 shows:
• Transferred arc: operating configuration, arcs go from the torch to the workpiece.
• Non-transferred arc: it usually happens at the beginning of the operation (in order to trig arcs), arcs are
produced inside the torch.
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Figure 30.2: Transferred an Non-transferred arcs.
It may happen to have non-transferred arcs during the operation becoming a problem, the so-called double arc
effect:
• arc becomes unstable, not continuous anymore;
• it wears out the tool.
Gas choice
The gas can be chosen depending on the particular application:
• argon if an inert gas is needed;
• oxygen or air if it’s useful to have an active gas;

the most used gas is nitrogen.
30.1 From TIG welding to plasma cutting

In Tungsten Inert Gas welding (TIG), there’s a tungsten cathode and the material which is electrically connected
to the cathode by a plasma channel (as in PAC):
Figure 30.3: TIG representation.
PAC and TIG are very similar one to each other, the main two differences between them are:
• the nozzle diameter: in TIG it is bigger, so there’s no constriction of arc, therefore the energy density on the
surface of material is smaller than the one reached by PAC;
153
• in TIG there’s an high pressure gas flow that keeps all the drosses within the area, in order not to waste
material for welding.
By the end PAC was born under the idea to constrict plasma arc, rising the surface’s energy density.
Figure 30.4: From TIG to PAC.
The first problem occurs at the nozzle, as Figure 30.4 shows the temperature is even higher than 24000K, there
are two way so solve this issue:
• nozzle could be made of a material which can sustain such temperatures;
• or an opposite solution: using a material capable of dissipate the huge amount of heat that has to face with,
such as copper that can dissipate electrical current too reducing the risk of double arc effect.
30.1.1 Nozzle-clogging
The constriction effect of plasma beam is further increased by the presence of tubular layer of non ionized gas that
separates the arc from the nozzle, this phenomenon is well known as nozzle-clogging:
Figure 30.5: Nozzle-clogging.
Because of this phenomenon it is possible to distinguish two different zones inside the beam:
1. the inner part which is hotter and conducts current;
2. the colder outer part that with higher density that:
• constricts the beam;
• cools down and protect the nozzle.
This phenomenon is also related to a mechanical action: nozzle-clogging generates a back-pressure at the nozzle
which implies an higher pressure on the anode (the metallic workpiece) and an acceleration of the stream; the force
generated allows the removal of molten material. The second problem is that back-pressure has to be taken under
control as the over pressure could act as a shield for arc transfer, facilitating non transferred arcs.
Inner part: higher temperature conducts the current
Outer part: lower temperature responsible of mass transport
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30.2 Dry torch
Dry Torch has been the reference in plasma cutting technology for many years, the progressive loss of energy density
across the material caused a huge curvature on the upper corner and burrs formation on bottom one:
Figure 30.6: Dry torch representation.
In dry torch there’s a reduction of the outflow section (due to the smaller nozzle diameter),
30.2.1 Traditional problems

The main problems are related to quality:
• large cutting kerf: the plasma beam is divergent;

• rounded edges;
• re-solidified material on the bottom in addition to burrs formation;

because of these issues it was considered as a bad technology, used just for separation cutting.
Figure 30.7: Cutting kerf.
The main problem of this configuration is the double arc effect, that leads to instability of the beam and it
causes irregularities in kerf and nozzle damages.
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Technology Characteristics Problems Application
lower energy density;
TIG drosses kept in welding area; no arc constriction; welding
big nozzle diameter;
back-pressure accelerates stream; burrs, large kerf and rounded edeges;
Dry torch constriction of plasma arc; material re-solidification; cutting
small nozzle diemeter; double arc effect;
Table 7: TIG vs dry torch.
30.3 Dual flow torch

As we saw in nozzle-clogging’s section the outer flow cools down the nozzle, using the same principle, dual flow
torch improves the cooling down effect introducing a second flow:
Figure 30.8: Dual flow torch representation.
so there are two gas flows:

• primary gas which is involved in plasma arc formation;
• secondary gas, which is the gas shield that:
– protects the material from oxidation;
– cools down the nozzle from outside;
– further constricts the plasma beam.
30.4 Water radial injection torch

Instead of an annular gas flow (dual flow torch) water radial injection torch uses water as cooling fluid; water with
its high specific heat is capable of cooling down faster than gas:
Figure 30.9: Water injection.
156
in fact in correspondence of the nozzle, water encounters plasma and a part of it instantaneously becomes vapor,
its latent heat extracts a lot of energy, cooling down the nozzle.
It has many advantages:
• nozzle cooling improved;
• double arc effect disappears due to the higher cooling;

• evaporating water further constricts the plasma beam;
anyway this configuration is not that used nowadays, probably because of some side issues:
• presence of fumes in working area;

• oxidation problem on machines;
• presence of mist which does not let one see what is going on.
30.4.1 Underwater plasma operation

In this case both the workpiece and the torch are underwater:
Figure 30.10: Underwater plasma operation.
Advantages:
• reducing light and noise discharges;
• free from environmental dust;

• workpiece and torch totally cooled down.
Disadvantages:
• speed reduced (10 ÷ 20%);

• lack of visibility;
• dissociation of water into O2 and H2.
Why is not used?
1. Having a water tank, it could be better used for a waterjet machine.
2. Lack of visibility, it has to be considered that waterjet, laser and plasma are flexible technologies, it means
that people frequently change setups since they want to see what is going on.
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31 High Definition Plasma (HDP)
High definition plasma has been the most successful commercialized option, in fact nowadays is the most adopted
one by producers also because HDP has great quality results, comparable to laser but faster.
After many experiments it turned out that building the torch (and its components) with strict tolerances
stabilizes the plasma, reducing double arc effect.
In HDP the gas is swirled (through the swirl ring, Figure 31.2), it flows around the electrode, the gas insertion
is then no more axial but lateral, and apparently the gas is more constrict at the nozzle, which means:
• higher density on the target;
• avoiding the contact between the beam and the nozzle.
Figure 31.1: HDP illustration.
There’s a presence of a second gas flow, like in dual flow torch, in addition to that there’s an overflow expulsion,
moreover this is the colder part of the stream and can be used to cool down the nozzle, so by the end the plasma
beam which hit the workpiece is:
• more constricted than before;
• hot;
• more uniform pressure;
this beam is very narrow and has nothing to do with TIG.
Remark 11. As Figure 31.1 shows there’s a taper angle that usually goes from 7 deg to 2-4 deg.
Better coaxiality of nozzles =⇒ Lower kerf taper
Ejecting the
Great energy
colder region =⇒ =⇒ More stable arcs =⇒ Higher flow rate
density
of the flow
As the following figure shows, the nozzle diameter can be even smaller than one millimeter, that’s why the
quality of this operation is comparable to the one of laser:
158
Figure 31.2: Parts of the nozzle.
Figure 31.3: Assembly of wearable parts of the torch.
31.1 HDP system

Usually in HDP systems there’s a gas console which by using electro-valves can control the flow of different gas
from different tanks, playing with different mixtures:
Figure 31.4: Mixtures.

for example a mixture of N2 + O2 is used for generating the initial arc, as it is less active and protects the nozzle
(the same happens when torch turns off); while when the arc is transferred wearing out the nozzle is not a problem
159
anymore and because of that it is possible to entirely use oxygen (that is more active due to the exothermic reaction
of oxidation on the material): this extend nozzle’s life, it can be possible to do up to 1200 cycles.
Summarizing the system can be represented as shown in following figure:
Figure 31.5: HDP system scheme.
where high frequency console is used for generating pilot arc.
Figure 31.6: Some parts.
In right bottom corner of Figure 31.6 is represented a HDP machine without cabin, that makes it very noisy, on
the other hand some machines with cabin allow to have noise reduction; always in this figure the torch is capable
to move along x and y direction, anyway there are many machines which allow movements along z too, as one has
to position the head, there are two options:
1. three axis (x, y, z);
2. two and a half, it means that the third axis is controlled at the beginning of the operation manually and then
it doesn’t change during the operation.
31.1.1 Gas console: plasma gas properties

We saw that two gases are used in this operation: a primary gas, which is used for generating plasma beam and
the secondary gas.
Primary gas purposes:
• Vaporization and fusion of workpiece (creating the groove where cutting begins);
158
• fluid dynamic pressure on the material;
• protection of electrode.
Secondary gas purposes:
• Protection of workpiece (it prevents oxidation and nitrurization);
• cooling down the cutting walls;
• protection of ceramic parts from thermal shocks.
Main features of plasma gas

1. Ionization potential: energy required to remove an electron from an atom, it influences the voltage of the arc
and the transmitted thermal power.
2. Thermal conductivity: locally, it influences the transport of internal energy.
3. Chemical reactivity: tendency of the gas to react with the work metal.
What is a good plasma gas?

For sure a gas with low ionization potential: it means that fraction of ionized particles, Figure 29.3 (here below
again), rapidly increases (low voltage to create high fraction of ionized particles):
Here some examples:
Figure 31.7: Examples of plasma gases.
159
nitrogen is preferred for some material such as stainless steel; argon has a low ionization potential and moreover
it is an inert gas, anyway it is very expensive; H35 is a very good plasma gas (but it is more expensive than argon),
as hydrogen prevents carbonization (carbon formation on the surface) and oxidation, there are two problems:
• percentage of hydrogen must not exceeds 35%, because the mixture would become dangerous, as hydrogen is
highly explosive;
• more expensive than other solutions.
31.2 HDP machines

As in waterjet there are two problems:
• absorbing the residual energy of the beam; usually by a given distance the beam cools down in air and
sometimes the bottom of the machine has to be cleaned from all drosses generated (they’re difficult to be
recycled, as they’re mainly oxides);
• the grid is shaped according to the workpiece, so time to time it has to be changed in order to clamp the
material, unless they’re enough heavy (unlike laser, where they have to be always well placed, as a high
precision is required52); anyway one has to consider that there are always vibration during the operation that
lead to a higher surface roughness and then worse quality, by the end clamping53 the workpiece guarantees a
cleaner cut.
Figure 31.8: Examples of machines.

As some hand operated plasma torches do exist, it is possible to build articulated robot which can easily move
around the workpiece, even if this is not that used:
Figure 31.9: Some machines for special operation.

52
Here standoff distance it is important too, it changes the voltage, but little variations aren’t that import as in laser with variation
of its spot size.
53Reducing vibrations.
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Hybrid machines are the most used ones, it means than in the same machine it is possible to combine more
operation such as PAC and punching (Figure 31.10), this is so useful: it maximizes the productivity, for example
if one has to trim the same square for several times, it is better to use punching system, while if the shape could
sometimes change it is possible to use plasma; while it is required to rapidly create something like (continuously)
the sheet represented in Figure 31.10, it is better to use a particular punch. Moreover this configuration saves space:
two different machines in the same place.
It is important to remember that unconventional manufacturing it is used for flexible production, when it
is necessary to rapidly change the setups, the drivers (market requirements)for advanced manufacturing processes
are:
• flexibility;
• mass customization (related to flexibility);

• operations on materials which can’t be done with conventional processes.
Figure 31.10: Hybrid machine.
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32 Process parameters
• Thermal energy beam:
– contactless interaction;
– limited forces on the workpiece;
– simple fixturing;
– presence of HAZ (Heat Affected Zone);
– presence of oxides and nitrides on the surface (unless one’s using H35).
• Cutting mechanism:
– the work surface heats up, melts and vaporizes;
– heating is due to:
∗ rain of electrons that release energy at a contact with the work;
∗ convection heating due to the hot plasma flow, this is the main way to heat up the workpiece;
∗ oxidation;
– the gas flow ejects the dross.
What are the requirements of the worked material which count?
• electrically conductive;
• better if it doesn’t conduct heat that well; as if it doesn’t heat remains in a narrow region.
There are limited forces on the workpiece, it is not distorted by mechanical actions but it might be distorted by
thermal actions, so some thermal residual stresses might occurs.
The main process parameters are:
• feed rate;
• current intensity (the higher the current, the hotter the plasma so the faster it can go;
32.1 Gas flow rate / pressure

It is correlated to the pressure (they’re proportional); typical values are:
• Pressure up to 1.4MPa, which corresponds a velocity of a few meter per second:
– the range depends on the type of material to be processed and on the torch;
– they are usually indicated by the manufacturers.
Increasing the pressure (that is the same of increasing the gas flow rate):
• one could expects a better quality, as if the speed increases it is possible to blow away more material;
• less probability of double arc effect, as plasma is well convoyed to the workpiece; so it is possible to increase
the current (and then the cutting speed), because the energy density is higher and so the interaction time
can be reduced. Anyway the drawback is that increasing the current means temperature increase leading to
a drawback: tool’s life becomes shorter;
• swirling effect increases and the beam becomes more constricted, reducing the divergence of the beam.
162
32.2 Arc current
The arc current is a function of the thickness of the material to be cut: if amperage increases so does the power
density of the arc.
Current is usually kept high in order to guarantee a high quality of cut, the typical value is:
I = 15 ÷ 400 A
If amperage increases:
• deeper thickness can be reached;
• shorter tool’s life;
considering a reference current of 100 A the power density is similar to the one of laser:
W W
109 ÷ 1010 2 = 105 ÷ 106 2
m cm
32.3 Feed rate

Feed rate and current are correlated one to each other (Figure 32.1):
Figure 32.1: Feed rate depending on thickness at different currents.
Remark 12. For a given thickness a limit in feed rate does exist, because exceeding this limit some striations occur.
• Feed rate is a function of the material and thickness to be cut;
• as feed rate increases, power density of the plasma jet must necessarily increase, because of increased amount
of material to be removed in unit of time;
• if feed rate is too fast:
– S striations;
– high taper;
– high speed burrs
besides there’s a limit to the power density the nozzle can bear;
• if feed rate is too slow:

– burrs at low speed;
– wide kerf.
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Figure 32.2: Current and cutting speed (for a given thickness).
As it is shown in Figure 32.2:
• for a given thickness and current, if one’s going too fast excess of striations and burrs occur, in addition no
cutting through cuts (⇒loss of cutting ability); moreover increasing the current, also the maximum feed rate
increases;
• current has a limit, in can’t exceed a specific value, otherwise it would burn the nozzle;
• in “dross-free area” there are some drosses, but they’re not that significant;
• at very low speed (one would like to go slow in order to cut very thick materials for instance), in the region
“low speed dross” there are formations of burrs and drosses;
Generally one would like to work at high cutting speed in order to maximize productivity, so working on “high-
speed limit” curve, but here the technology might be very expensive (even because of nozzle wearing out), therefore
it possible to find an optimal velocity (economical point of view) which is not the highest one, but it takes
place inside the region between high-speed limit and low-speed limit. While in laser and waterjet reducing the
cutting speed improves quality of the operation, in PAC there’s an optimal velocity for quality; by the end the
optimization of velocity has to be done by two different point of views:
• economical one;
• quality;
if the cutting speed is too low negative conicity occurs (Figure 32.3), while at high cutting speed the conicity is
positive, it means that it is possible to match the optimal cutting speed at which kerf is vertical (if one is interested
into obtain both sides of the workpiece):
Figure 32.3: Influence of velocity.
anyway there’s still a problem: unlike waterjet and laser, in PAC the conicity is not symmetric, probably due
to the swirling (one side is touched by a colder gas while the other one by a hotter one) as we’ll see in the next
chapter.
164
32.4 Standoff distance
Considering Ohm’s law: 
V → voltage

V = RI R → resistance


I → current
I has to be constant, the resistance R depends on the standoff distance as a consequence voltage V must be
adjusted.
Figure 32.4: Standoff distance.
Like the speed, there is an optimal standoff distance with respect to quality, generally best quality means straight
walls.
V is used as symbol of the standoff distance, as it is proportional to the voltage: if distance increases, more
voltage is required.
Parameter Consequences
Pressure/gas flow rate ↑ double arc effect ↓ swirling effect ↑ current can ↑ ⇒ temperature ↑ ⇒ tool’s life ↓
Current’s amperage ↑ thickness reached ↑ tool’s life ↓ -
Feed rate ↑ S striations ↑ taper ↑ high speed burrs ↑
Feed rate ↓ burrs at low speed ↑ kerf width ↑ -
Standoff distance ↑ resistance ↑ voltage required ↑ -
Table 8: Resuming parameters.
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33 Cutting quality
There are many parameters which describes the quality of the cut:
• taper;
• kerf width;
• height of dross or burrs;

• conicity;
• top edge roundness;
• heat affected zone by using micrographics;
Figure 33.1: Some quality parameters.
33.1 Taper and asymmetric kerf

As we saw in subsection 32.3, taper is influenced by cutting speed:
Figure 33.2: Cutting speed and taper (three different images, not in scale).
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Figure 33.3: Positive and negative inclination.
The swirl ring inside the torch creates a vortex of gas which is typically clockwise, as represented in Figure33.4
the right kerf wall corresponds to the outlet of the gas so the coolest part: because of that, kerf width will be larger
on the left side and smaller on the right one, as a consequence it is possible to obtain a vertical wall only on the
right side (where material removal rate is smaller).
Figure 33.4: How swirling affects taper.
The consequence of phenomenon previously explained, considering one would like to create a ring for instance
(Figure 33.5) the inner part has to be done with torch moving clockwise and the outer part moving counterclockwise,
as the right side (considering the feed direction) is “the good one”, the one with higher quality.
Figure 33.5: Ring production example.
By the end the “good side” depends on:

• cutting direction;
• amount of cutting speed, as there’s an optimal one;
167
• standof f distance, as there’s an optimal one:

transferred energy ↑

if V ↑ ⇒ removal rate ↑


kerf width ↑
by changing these parameters it is possible to obtain a quality comparable to laser’s one.
33.2 Striations
Many times striations have an S-shape, unlike waterjet’s ones these striations does have an inflection point (curvature
changes), and they strongly depend on the cutting speed:
Figure 33.6: Striations.
unlike waterjet here it’s difficult to find out what the direction of the torch has been chosen just by looking at
striations.
33.3 Burrs
Burrs are due to melted material drops, which move along the walls of cutting kerf until the bottom part where
re-solidify, they can be asymmetric as well and they depend on the feed rate:
Figure 33.7: Burrs at different feed rates.
It is possible to quantify burrs by their height:
Figure 33.8: Burr’s height.
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33.4 Top spatter
Top spatter is caused by fast cutting or by too high torch height setting; reducing cut speed or lowering torch
cutting height will reduce top spatter, which is easy to be removed anyway.
Figure 33.9: Top spatter.
33.5 Heat affected zone

Heat affected zone or HAZ is influenced by the cutting speed; the smaller the HAZ the higher resistance to corrosion
and fatigue.
Figure 33.10: Heat affected zone.
33.6 Surface finish

In HDP considering the roughness Ra does not make sense, as it would be greater than 10 − 12µm, it is better to
take in account the waviness but it depends: let’s take Figure 33.11 as an example, the surface quality of left piece
is better than the other one, in this case talking about roughness could make sense; generally roughness depends
on the combination of:
• the gas which is used: it determines the appearance of the surface, according on the formation of oxides or
re-solidifying material:
– Oxygen and air + oxygen (active gas):

∗ carbon steel: brilliant and smooth surfaces;
∗ light alloys: brilliant and irregular surfaces;
∗ stainless: opaque and irregular surfaces;
– Nitrogen (inert gas):
∗ generally smooth surfaces;
∗ nitrogen diffusion causing micro-cracks;
• the material which is cut;
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Figure 33.11: Surface finish comparison.
The limit with HDP is 25mm of thickness, above this value quality get worse:
Material Thickness [mm] Feed rate [m/min] Current [A]

Carbon steel 0.9 ÷ 12.7 0.635 ÷ 7.1 15 ÷ 100
Stainless steel 0.4 ÷ 12.7 0.762 ÷ 6.35 30 ÷ 100
Aluminum 1.2 ÷ 12.7 0.635 ÷ 3.81 70
Copper 3.4 ÷ 9.5 0.635 ÷ 1.524 70
Table 9: Typical values.
Plasma vs laser
No matter what the thickness is, plasma plant will be generally cheaper than a laser one; moreover as we saw in
the previous chapters about plasma, this technology can reach quality which is comparable to the one of laser and
waterjet, while its speed is way higher.
Figure 33.12: Investment costs plasma vs laser.
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34 Applications
There are different application of plasma technology:
• cutting;
• welding, even if people prefer to use TIG for welding;
• or some unusual operations like:

– marking;
– tapering;
– drilling;
– controlled depth milling;
– turning
• coating:
– plasma spraying;
– Plasma Chemical Vapor Deposition;
– Plasma Physical Vapor Deposition;
• surface treatments:
– plasma hardening;
– alligation;
– vitrification;
• heat treatments;
• powder production.
34.1 Plasma arc welding

It is very similar to TIG (Tungsten Inert Gas welding); it is typically autogenous: the material melts and contributes
to the welding:
Figure 34.1: Plasma arc welding.
two gases can be used:

• one gas for creating plasma arc;
• one gas for shielding;
171
the approach is usually manual, but cnc can be used; changing the current (so the power density) we can distinguish
(as in laser) between conduction and keyhole welding:
Current [A] Thickness [mm] Process

0.1 ÷ 20 0.1 ÷ 1 conduction
15 ÷ 200 1÷3 conduction
> 100 1 ÷ 10 keyhole
the ranges are similar, that means it is possible to change between conduction and keyhole according to transfer
speed.
34.2 Plasma spray

The purpose is to coat a substrate which can be both metal or ceramic material, it has to be a material that can
sustain very high temperatures: the coating material (usually powders) is the one which melts (the substrate does
not);
so purposes are:
• dimensional restauration;
• increase abrasion resistance, wear, corrosion, cavitation;
• thermal, electrical, chemical insulation.
Usually noble materials are sprayed in order to improve the surface, typically:
• hard metals (M o, W, Nb);

• alloy N iAl, iron alloys, nickel, cobalt, N iCr, stainless;
• ceramic materials (Si 3 N 4, SiC);
• plastics.
About the environment, it is not critical, so controlled atmosphere is not needed: low pressure or vacuum are
not that used; finally the arc can be transferred or non transferred according to the power energy required by the
material:
Figure 34.2: Plasma spray.
in transferred arc power feed is internal, the beam is more focused and this configuration is more used for
repairing operations.
34.2.1 Thermal spray deposition

In thermal spray deposition, plasma source is very far from the material, it is used to coat large surfaces; for example
it can be used to cover a copper substrate with a ductile material like ceramic:
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Figure 34.3: Thermal spray deposition.
34.3 Ultra-fine powder production

A wire of metal runs axially along a plasma torch in order to be melted,the whole process takes place in a vacuum
chamber, in order to avoid contamination of powders produced, moreover one purpose is to maintain powders
separated one to each other and with low pressure (or in vacuum chamber) it is easier to obtain that; the typical
shape of these droplets is spherical, which cool down as they fall down until the bottom of the chamber where
they’re collected:
Figure 34.4: Powder production.
because of the high temperatures it is possible to make powders of materials with very high melting point
34.4 Other plasma coating processes: PVD and CVD

Sintering of thin films of hard material (hard materials: T iC, T iN , Al2O3) from components present in the gaseous
phase, thanks to the occurrence of one or more chemical reactions surface. The energy required for the activation
of chemical reactions can be provided by a discharge plasma.
PVD (Physical Vapor Deposition) and CVD (Chemical Vapor Deposition) are typical coating technologies,
vapor deposition is the common characteristic; there are two electrodes which generate plasma, the difference here
is that the electric field is distributed along a surface (so it’s not like the arc in torches) in order to cover it all at
the same time.
173
Figure 34.5: PVD example.
How is it possible to have plasma with no arc?

Remembering plasma classification54 (Subsection 29.2), while the black circle (Figure 34.6) represents the oper-
ational region of plasma cutting and plasma welding, the red one represents PVD and CVD region, the glow region:
reduction of density of particles by creating vacuum inside the chamber ( ⇒ temperatures decreases as well):
Figure 34.6: Plasma classification.
34.4.1 Physical Vapor Deposition (or Sputtering)

• Sputtering involves hitting of the cathodic coating material by argon ions (Ar+), causing surface atoms to
escape and then be deposited onto a substrate, forming a thin film on the substrate surface by condensation;
• the substrate must be placed close to the cathode and is usually heated to improve bonding of the coating
atoms;
• sputtering can be applied to a wide range of metallic and nonmetallic materials;
• traces of the gas can usually be found into the coated films.
In PVD the material, which is in form of vapor, it is deposited over the substrate as it is attracted by the electrode,
because of the presence of the electrode, the substrate material can be even non conductive: vapor will be attracted
anyway by the electrode:
54It’s important to remember even the electric discharged chart (Figure 29.4, Subsection 29.1.3), where there’s a glow region.
174
Figure 34.7: PVD scheme.
the material to be evaporated can come from the cathode itself (sacrificial cathode) or can be fed externally,
but this last configuration is not that used.
This process could be down thermally without plasma source: thermal source makes evaporate the material and
then gravity can be used for deposition, anyway PVD leads to a better quality and that’s why it is widely used.
34.4.2 Plasma enhanced CVD (PECVD)

PVD and CVD are very similar (as machine used in these processes as well), the only difference is that in CVD
some chemical reaction take place:
Figure 34.8: CVD scheme.
• Chemical vapor deposition involves the interaction between a mixture of gases and the surface of a heated
substrate film on the substrate;
• the reaction product (either a metal or a compound) nucleates and grows on the substrate surface to forms
the coating;
• PECVD processing is often used for substrates that have a lower thermal budget requirement.
175
Chemical reaction which take place in CVD are aimed to create hard products (in order to have hard coatings):
carbides, nitrides or oxides; for examples cutting tools are made of tungsten carbide tied together with a matrix of
cobalt.
Sometimes the hardness required is so high that more than one layers have to be deposited, such as a layer of
tungsten carbide, one of tungsten nitride exc. that in CVD come from chemical reactions:
Figure 34.9: Layers in a cutting tool.
Sometimes there can be several layers of different materials with different thickness, as the figure below shows,
multiphase coatings on a tungsten-carbide substrate, three alternating layers of aluminum oxide are separated by
very thin layers of titanium nitride. Inserts with as many as thirteen layers of coatings have been made, coating
thicknesses are typically in the range of 2 to 10 µm:
Figure 34.10: Layers.
this is used because of:

• adhesion;
• fragility: these materials are generally fragile, and the difference of hardness between the substrate and the
surface must change slowly, in order to increase the strength of the layer: the usual hardness test can’t be
done in this case, as we couldn’t know deep the pendulum went, how many layers it has crossed, that’s why
usually one tries to remove layer by layer making different measurements.
Suitable materials are:
• metals: tungsten, molybdenum, titanium, vanadium, and tantalum;
• compounds: aluminum oxide(Al2O3), silicon dioxide (SiO2), silicon nitride (Si3N4), titanium carbide (T iC),
and titanium nitride (T iN ).
The inner part of the chamber can have multiple rotating systems in order to have a more uniform deposition:
Figure 34.11: Inner part of a chamber.
176
• Advantages:
– capability to deposit refractory materials at temperatures below their melting or sintering temperatures;
– control of grain size is possible;
– he process is carried out at atmospheric pressure, it does not require vacuum equipment;
– good bonding of coating to the substrate surface.
• Disadvantages:
– corrosive and/or toxic nature of chemicals generally needs a closed chamber as well as special pumping
and disposal equipments;
– some reaction agents are relatively expensive;
– low efficiency in material utilization.
34.5 Other applications

Other (less common) processes using the plasma source as a source of thermal, chemical, kinetic energy:
• Alloying: diffusion and permeation of elements from the surface to the substrate to form a layer with a
different composition. By deposition of material not only a coating of the substrate is created, but some parts
of the substrate melts and it can be possible to create alloys (⇒ inter-metallic layers).
• Hardening: the plasma source is used to locally heat the surface over the temperature of complete austeni-
tization; used for self.hardening materials.
• Vitrification/Glazing: surface hardening by transformation into an amorphous surface subjected to a
sudden warming.
• Processing of polymeric materials: change some properties (optical reflection, permeability, conductivity,
biocompatibility, adhesion) by the plasma beam; change adhesion in plastic, it’s useful to paint for example.
177
Part VIII
Electric Discharge Machine
Electric Discharge Machining (EDM) is (mainly) a thermal process that has some similarities with Plasma arc
cutting. There is a difference of voltage between the tool and the workpiece, but instead than a continuous arc (like
in plasma technology) there are a lot of impulses (high energy in a short time). EDM can work very hard material
(too hard to use traditional process) and can copy or create 2D or 3D shape geometry on it.
35 PLUNGE (or die-sinking) EDM

35.1 Process and System
Figure 35.1: Plunge EDM with discharge area and gap profile
The tool (also called die tool) has the shape of the final geometry55 to be obtained, apart the tolerances and the
gap. The process occurs inside a dielectric fluid, a difference of voltage is applied between the consumable tool
and the workpiece and when the break voltage is reached a spark occurs. This spark happens where there is the
minimum electric resistance, that in generally is where there is the minimum gap. The dielectric fluid promotes
the dielectric arc creation, decreased its section and has also the duty to take away the material removed from the
workpiece and from the tool.
In Plunge EDM the direct polarity is used, so:
• Die tool: anode (-)
• Workpiece: cathode (+)
The conventional system is represented in figure 35.2, where all the electric components and power supply are not
reported. The workpiece is submerged inside the dielectric fluid, which has to be filtered from the metal particles
released during the erosion process and pumped again in the working area.
The material removal rate obtained is very small (0 ÷ 4, 5 cm3/min), the dimension tolerance and the surface
roughness can vary a lot according to the process parameters (respectably ±0, 02 ÷ 0, 12 mm and 0, 2 ÷ 0, 12 µm). In
order to archive these high tolerances the machine structure has to be very rigid to avoid vibrations and deformations.
55More precisely, it is the negative shape of the final piece. But if our final workpiece is a die that will produce other objects, for
example with an injection moulding process, the tool has the same positive shape of the final object.
178
Figure 35.2: Plunge EDM system
35.2 Configurations
Figure 35.3: EDM configurations
In figure 35.3 are represented some different configurations and applications of EDM:
• (a): conventional die-sinking. In particular in (a.1) the dielectric fluid can reach the working area through
some holes on the tool; instead in (a.2) it can be supplied also through some hole on the workpiece. The two
different configurations depend on the final shape that has to be obtained.
• (b.1): boring operation with vertical feed
• (b.2): helical reaming with vertical feed and rotary movement combined
• (c.1): internal grinding; (c.2): tangential grinding
• (d): milling
• (e): circular sawing
• (f.1): band sawing
• (f.2): wire EDM
The configurations enclosed in the red boxes are the most used.
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36 Electric circuits
There are two type of circuits that can be adopted in order to generate the spark. The first invented (1943) is the
Lazarenko’s circuit and the second is the transistor one. In general both circuits are implemented on the machine
and the operator can choose which use.
In both circuit the breakdown voltage depends on the dielectric fluid and on the gap. The voltage is continuously
measured in closed loop in order the regulate the vertical feed rate and keep the gap constant.
36.1 Lazarenko circuit

This circuit, also called RC circuit (or relaxation circuit) due to the presence of the resistor and the capacitor, is
represented in figure 36.1. The DC power generator (that is always on) charges the capacitor through the resistor.
When the voltage of the capacitor reaches the breakdown tension of the dielectric this one becomes conductive and
the spark occurs. The voltage and current profile are reported in figure 36.2. The on-time is very short (so also the
duty cycle is small, in general 0,1) and the peak current is very high. The current profile isn’t square and the high
peak value (more than 1000 A) can melt or damage the tool.
If the dielectric liquid is contaminated by small conductive particles (for example removed during the discharge
process) the breakdown voltage decreases and the spark may occurs always in the same place (insufficient dielectric
circulation system).
Figure 36.1: Lazarenko circuit
Figure 36.2: Lazarenko circuit voltage and current profile
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36.2 Transistor circuit
The transistor improves the situation because we can obtain a more square current profile and for a longer time.
In particular, respect to the RC circuit, we have the following advantages:
• higher efficiency
• reduction of the cycle time (shorter off time) → frequency increases → MRR increases
• lower current → reduction of the temperature → less wear on the tool
In this circuit the tension and the current is governed by the transistor so we can control all the process parameters
(on and off time, current). During the process the current and the tension are measure in order to keep them at
the correct value. We can distinguish three main zones in the cycle:
1. no current and maximum voltage for a short time: break the dielectric
2. almost constant current for a “long” time: erosion process
3. no current and no tension: discharge the dielectric, cool down the tool and take away the particles removed
during the process.
Figure 36.3: Transistor circuit
Figure 36.4: Transistor circuit voltage and current profile
181
36.3 Discharge current profile
Figure 36.5: Discharge current profile
I figure 36.5 are reported four different discharge current profile (transistor circuit) obtained with different gap
conditions:
• a) correct gap distance: erosion process with almost square V and I profile
• b) gap too high: the voltage applied isn’t enough to break the dielectric
• c) gap too small (or maybe also contact between tool and workpiece): short circuit
• d) lower voltage than expected and higher current: the spark occurs always in the same place due to the
presence of polluted liquid since the dielectric fluid isn’t properly flushed
As previously said, in order to keep the correct gap and the correct process parameters a closed loop measurement
system of V and I is required.
182
37 Material removal process
Figure 37.1: Material removal process story board
The material removal process can be subdivided into 4 main phases, as illustrated in figure 37.1:
1. Ignition phase: start of the spark

2. Plasma formation: some material is removed, start of the material removing process
3. Discharge phase: constant current and most of the material removal process
4. Ejection phase: remove the current
37.1 Ignition and Plasma formation
Figure 37.2: Ignition phase (1-2) and plasma formation (3)
These phases are characterized by:
1. increasing the tension without flowing of current

2. formation of the electric field
3. movements of electrons from the anode (-) to the cathode (+), but this isn’t really a current
4. partial ionization of the dielectric fluid at the end of the ignition (figure 2)
183
5. The tension decreases and the current starts flowing (figure 3)
During the plasma formation the electrons, that are lighter and faster, move up toward the cathode, instead the
ions, that are heavier, moves down toward the anode. As we can see from figure 37.3, at the beginning of the
process the wear of the tool56 (anode) is higher than the one on the cathode, due to the motion of the electrons.
Then the positive ions that start flowing increase the erosion of the cathode. The MRR behavior is non symmetric
between anode and cathode and there is a different on time that maximize the MRR. In the case of direct polarity,
if we are not sure about the correct on time that maximize the MRR, it is better to apply the current for a longer
time in order to preserve the tool life. Due to this, for direct polarity, the on time is always at least 30 µs.
Figure 37.3: MRR for direct polarity
37.2 Discharge phase
Figure 37.4: Discharge phase
The current increases and the positive and negative ions migrates respectively toward the cathode and the anode.
A vapor channel forms and the melting process starts. The bauble of vapor grows and the pressure inside it can
increase up to 20 MPa (the bauble doesn’t have to explode, otherwise the process will stop), the temperature also
increase at 4000 ÷10000 °C. During this phase, that occurs mainly at constant current, the material removal process
is generated by melting and fusion (and maybe also some vaporization).
56
This is true for direct polarity, in the case of inverse polarity the behavior of the tool and the workpiece are switched.
184
37.3 Ejection phase
Figure 37.5: Ejection phase
In this phase the voltage is removed and so also the current will decrease to zero, in particular we have that:
1. the discharge channel rapidly disappears (figure 7)
2. the vaporized metal solidifies in the dielectric fluid as hollow micro-spheres (figure 37.6.a)
3. the melted metal solidifies in the dielectric fluid into fill micro-sphere (figure 37.6.b)
4. The bauble decreases its internal pressure and so reduces its dimension imploding (figure 8). This implosion
produces a cavitation effect on the workpiece, that represents an additional material removal process.
5. Then some time at zero current is required in order to flush and de-ionize the dielectric fluid (figure 9), before
to start another cycle.
At the end of the phase the fluid has some pollutants inside it, these aren’t only the material particles removed
from the workpiece and from the tool, but also some additional carbons coming from the fluid itself. In particular
using kerosene, the high temperature may degrade the chemical structure of the liquid releasing carbon atoms and
molecules. Then these carbons may be absorbed by the workpiece by diffusion, increasing the carbon content on
its surface.
Figure 37.6: Re-solidified material: (a) vaporized metal into hollow micro-sphere; (b) melted metal into fill micro-
sphere
37.4 Process parameters: Lazarenko vs Transistor

In table 10 are reported the typical process value for the tho power supply circuits. Note that with the transistor
we can choose the discharge time according to the minimum quality required in order to maximize the MRR. So in
general, the transistor has an higher productivity and the Lazarenko circuit provides a better quality. This is why
in general the machines have both circuits and we can choose the first instead the second according to the process
(roughing or finishing), as also illustrated in figure 37.7. Note also that, according to figure 37.3, there is an optimal
value of the on time that maximizes the MRR.
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Lazarenko’s circuit Power transistor circuit
Tension 100 ÷ 500 V (continuous) 60 ÷ 120 V
Disc Current ( ) 1000 A 0 1 ÷ 100 A
harge time ton 0, 1 µs , 1 ÷ 100 µs
T otal time (ttot) 200 µs 5 ÷ 200 µs
Pulse frequency 5 kHz 5 ÷ 200 kHz
Table 10: Process parameters
Figure 37.7: Process comparison
37.5 Effect of the process parameters on quality
Figure 37.8: Quality comparison
As we can see prom figure 37.8, the MRR increases as both the discharge current and the discharge time ton increase,
but in particular we have that:
• increase the current keeping ton constant → the surface quality is still good (figure a)
• increase the ton keeping the current constant → the surface quality decreases (the roughness increases) (figure
b)
The MRR increases also increasing the voltage.
The frequency can be increased by reducing ton or tof f or both, generally larger frequency gives better surface
quality (figure c):
• low frequency: higher MRR but lower quality → roughing
• high frequency: lower MRR but higher quality → finishing
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To increase the surface quality we can also reduce the gap, but the fluid flow suffers higher resistance (higher
pressure drop). In general the gap is 0, 012÷0, 050 mm and it is controlled with a closed loop on the breakdown
voltage. The gap should be constant on the whole surface between the tool die and the workpiece but this isn’t
always true, in particular on the lateral walls and on the corners. On the corners there are more external surfaces
area in which the spark can occurs, so we have an higher erosion of the corner’s tool. Due to this it is difficult to
obtain sharp edges with EDM. Also on the lateral walls the erosion isn’t uniform due to the different time in which
the spark can occurs moving along the vertical direction of the tool. These concepts are also represented in figure
37.9.
Figure 37.9: Tool wear: (a) real example; (b) original tool; (c) worn tool
37.6 Surface morphology

In figure 37.10 are represented some crater produced by the sparks. The final quality strongly depends on its
dimension and on the amount of re-solidified material around it.
In figure 37.11 are reported the different surface quality obtained with different processes, in particular with
Wire EDM we can obtain a better quality than with die sinking EDM.
Figure 37.10: (a) Crater on the cathode; (b) Crater on the anode; (c) Superimposition of different craters
Figure 37.11: Surface morphology: (a) Grinding; (b) Plunge EDM; (c) Wire EDM
These craters of re-solidified material are bounded to the bottom surface, the high temperature and the successive
cooling process can induce some thermal damage in the following zones (figure 37.12):
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• A) Layer or recast material, it can be also a white oxide layer (thickness of 1 ± 40 µm and hardness up to 65
HRC)
• B) Heat affected zone (< 200 µm)
• C) There is no structural modification (no HAZ) but still a thermal effect is present (400 µm depth from the
surface)
During the re-solidification of the superficial layer, the cooling process will induce a contraction of the material and
so a residual tensile strength. If this stress is too high the oxide layer can crack as illustrated in figure 37.13.c. If the
crack happens during the roughing process it doesn’t matter, but it doesn’t have to happen during the finishing.
The white oxide layer is produced due to the presence of oxygen if we use de-ionized water as dielectric fluid
(chemical reaction at high temperature), in order to limit or better eliminate the oxide we have to choose the correct
process parameters and the correct dielectric fluid.
The fast cooling process on the surface will also change the properties of the material increasing the hardness
(figure 37.13.b).
With the actual technologies and setting the correct process parameters we are able to eliminate the oxide layer
and obtain the result of figure 37.14, with a roughness (Ra) less than 0, 1 µm and a HAZ less than 1 µm.
Figure 37.12: Surface cross section morphology
Figure 37.13: Surface cross section: (a) Layers; (b) Hardness measurements; (c) Crack on the white layer
Figure 37.14: Best surface quality obtainable: (a) Steel; (b) Hard metal
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38 Tools
38.1 Material
The main properties that the tool must have are:
• Low wear rate with high thermal conductivity and high melting point
• High electric conductivity

• Good machinability (in order to produce the tool)
• Low cost
Then, for die sinking EDM, we want that MRRtool « MRRworkpiece. To obtain this we can write the following
relation (Weller’s formula that is valid only for the cathode) between the two melting temperature:
1,23
1 1
Tm » T 1,23
m
tool workpiece
or better
1 1
k · ρ · cp · Tm2tool » k · ρ · cp · Tm2workpiece
where:
• k is the thermal conductivity [W/ (mK)]

1
• ρ is the density kg/m 3
• cp is the specific heat at constant temperature [J/ (kg · K)]
And in particular we have that:
• ρ · cp · Tm represents the heat necessary to melt a specific volume

• k · Tm is proportionality to the heat quantity dissipated by conduction
Considering all there properties and requirements the materials suitable to produce the tool are the following:
• COPPER: good resistance to corrosion, easy to be machined and particularly suitable to machine TiC
• GRAPHITE: also easy to machine, generally is preferred than copper, but produces a lot of dust in the
dielectric fluid. Its cost is 2, 5 ÷ 10 times higher than copper tools.
• Copper-Tungsten alloy / Copper-Silver: sintered tools used for deep hole drilling where dielectric feed is
difficult. Its costs is 18 ÷ 100 times higher than copper tools.
It is important to notice that the tool has to by produced by a traditional manufacturing processes like milling and
turning, so we have to machine a tool that in turn will machine another workpiece. This is necessary because the
final workpiece is too hard to be machined with conventional manufacturing process, but the graphite / copper tool
can be produced easily. We have also to pay a lot of attention on the tolerances of all these processes, because the
tolerance of the final workpiece (that in general is a die, so it must have an high tolerance because it is used to
produce other pieces) is affected by the tolerances of all the previous operations (tolerance on the gap, corner wear,
tolerance on the electrode machining, ...).
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38.2 Tools wear
The tool wear, that was partially explained in chapter 37.5 yet, can be subdivided in the following main categories:
• Corner wear: the most important because it determines the accuracy of the final cut
• End wear: it isn’t a problem because it can be compensated thanks to the closed loop control of the gap
distance
• Side wear: if it is uniform it can be compensated
In particular corner wear is generated by the electromagnetic field that that tends to concentrate mainly in the
corner, generating also more sparks than in the other surfaces. Corner wear can be minimized choosing a small
particle size for the electrode material, that has higher strength and higher density. So for example, for the tool we
can use graphite instead of copper.
In order to reduce the wear on the tool, we can also increase the frequency of the pulse.
Figure 38.1: Tool wear
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39 Dielectric fluid
The dielectric fluid is required to have some main characteristics; in order to obtain these characteristics the fluid
has to have some specific properties, that are obtainable with specific fluids.
In particular the main characteristics are:
• promote the spark formation with the highest possible frequency
• cool down the electrode
• flush away all the small particles removed from the workpiece and from the tool
To obtain these characteristics the fluid must have the following properties:
• high ionization capacity for an efficient spark creation

• rapid de-ionization to allow higher pulse frequency
• low viscosity
• low flammability
• low chemical reactiveness with the workpiece metal
In order to obtain these properties the following fluids are adopted:
• oils (ex. kerosene, ...): used for machining hard metals
• silicon oils
• de-ionized water: it contains oxygen so it can promote the oxidation and the white layer formation
Another important think is the way in which we supply the fluid in the working area, there are four main possibilities
as refigured in figure 39.1. The choose depends mainly in the geometry of the final product: if it has some holes or
if the surface is fully closed.
Then it is important also the balance between pressure and flow rate, that depends mainly on the gap:
• roughing operation: large gap → higher flow rate and lower pressure
• finishing operation: small gap → smaller flow rate and higher pressure
In order to guarantee the correct remotion of all the small metal particles in the fluid, at the very slow vertical feed
rate of the tool is superimposed a large oscillation motion.
Figure 39.1: Dielectric fluid supply
40 Applications
This process is typically adopted for the production of moulds, die and tools in particularly for: die casting, injection
moulds, blow molding, extrusion dies and blanking/punching dies. The typical materials worked are: tool steel,
mould steel, WC and ceramics.
The main industries and application sectors that use this technology are:
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• Aerospace industry: complex component with hight tolerances made of highly resistant alloys such as titanium,
aluminum and magnesium
• Automotive industry
• Biomedical industry: prothesis, surgery tools or corrosion resistant components such as titanium and other
non conventional materials
• Valuable metals: luxury industry or design components demanding for high precisions and smooth surface
finishing made of stainless steel, titanium, brass, gold and silver
• Deep hole drilling: holes with a ratio D/L up to 1:100 can be machined for injectors or cooling circuits in
turbine blades
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41 WIRE EDM
Figure 41.1: Wire EDM layout
Wire Electro Discharge Machining (WEDM) is one of the most precise process known nowadays. The process is
the same used for the die sinking EDM, but there is a different machine layout as represented in figure 41.1. The
machine is very rigid in order to have an high precision on the final piece, in general it is a 2-axis (the x-y worktable)
machine as represented in the example of figure 41.2. We can also increase the number of axis, for example adding
some rotations at the worktable in order to obtain inclined kerf walls.
Figure 41.2: Example of Wire EDM machine (left) and kerf example (right)
The tool is represented by a standard wire produced by wire drawing, so it is very cheap respect to the Plunge
EDM tools. In this case the inverse polarity is adopted, so:
• Wire: Cathode (+)

• Workpiece: Anode (-)
This implies that the erosion of the wire is much bigger than the one on the workpiece, as represented in figure
41.3. Using a wire as tool this is not a problem because the wire is continuously renewed and we can obtain an
excellent surface quality and tolerance: the kerf obtained is directly the finishing surface, there is no difference
between roughing and finisching. This time we have to maximize the MRR of the anode and so the on-time is very
small, in general is around 2 µs.
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Figure 41.3: MRR for inverse polarity
Wire EDM is used to realize 2D cut on metal sheets. If the cut path is closed and inside the workpiece a pre-hole
is necessary to insert the wire. In general this hole is realized with the die sinking EDM because the material is too
hard to be drilled with conventional technologies.
Then the wire must be placed in tension in order to avoid bending of the wire itself, that is induced by the
electric field generated by the sparks. The tensile stress is proportional to the precision of the machining and it is
limited only by the failure stress of the wire itself. Also the wire tension is controlled in closed loop in order to keep
it at the correct value.
Figure 41.4: Effect of the wire bending
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42 MICRO EDM
Micro EDM uses wire EDM to produce a micro tungsten tool, that is used for micro machining (for example micro
drilling). This micro tool wears out very rapidly so it is continuously renewed. The wire EDM is necessary in order
to produce a micro tool (for example less than 50 µm diameter) from an original bar with a bigger diameter, as
shown in figure 42.1.
Figure 42.1: Wire EDM producing a micro tool
Figure 42.2: Micro EDM tools example
42.1 Macro vs Micro EDM

In the following table is reported a comparison between the different process parameters for macro and micro EDM.
Macro Micro
Principle Thermal material removal Similar
Equipment
Dielectric Mineral oil, de-ionized water Mineral oil
Flushing External and internal no flushing
Electrode Material Copper / Graphite Tungsten
Process Parameters
Current 0, 5 ÷ 400 A 0, 1 ÷ 10 mA
Voltage 40 ÷ 400 V 60 ÷ 120 V
Pulse Duration ton 0, 5 ÷ 8000 µs 0, 1 ÷ 1000 ns
Electro de Wear Ratio 1÷5% 1, 5 ÷ 100 %
Surface Roughness 0, 8 ÷ 3, 1 µm 0, 07 ÷ 1 µm
Table 11: Process parameters comparison
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Part IX
Introduction to Additive Manufacturing
processes
43 Main features
Additive Manufacturing (AM) refers to a process by which digital 3D design data is used to build a component in
layers by depositing or growing solid material. Main characteristics, that make AM industrially relevant respect
conventional processes as forming and casting, are:
• Completely digital technology (according to the trend to move to the industry 4.0): as it is computerized,
it requires starting from a 3D CAD model of a part (exported in STL format). CAD model is then sliced into
a stack of layers and each layer is converted into a path (or trajectory) which is followed by the AM machine
during the build of the part.
• No dedicated tools required.
• Great geometrical complexity allowed: this is the most important factor since it allows significant
complex shape, as shown in the figure below, independently from undercuts. It also lets to optimize the
material (i.e. removing that material that is not needed) obtaining the so called topological optimization: as
an example, given a strength requirement, AM optimizes the shape.
Figure 43.1: Example of AM product.
• in a particular case, it generates a superior hardness respect to other technologies: for example, EBM can
be selected not because it is flexible, cheap, fast or complex but because it gives to the part a very enhanced
mechanical properties (improves strength, fatigue resistance,...).
Formerly, AM is also known as:
• Rapid Prototyping: it is an additive production using for prototypes (not for products or industrial parts).
Notice that it is completely digital and dieless, very important characteristic and advantage.
• Rapid Tooling: same characteristics of the previous type but, in this case, it is used to additive production of
molds and tools.
• “3D printing”: general name increasingly used as a synonym for AM.
• Stereolitography (STL): STL was the first AM technology

Names and applications of additive manufacturing change a lot in the last years mainly due to two factors:
1. Technological push: the range of applications increases since there is an evolution in the types and numbers
of technologies used. Moreover, the quality of the process increases and also the speed increases;
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2. Market-pool motivation: AM can guarantee more mass customization, a field of the market that is in-
creasing itself as shown in fig.43.2. Since we have just to build a small amount of part per year, we want to
reduce the realization of dedicated tools as much as possible; in this way, AM is a good choice to save money
and has a good flexibility of the process.
Figure 43.2: Industrial relevant field for additive manufacturing.
In figure 43.3, it is illustrated a general process chain in which there isn’t a significant human presence:
• The process starts from a CAD drawing and then there is the creation of a STL file;
• A part orientation is needed in order to improve the quality and the speed of the process. Additionally, some
support structures must be created and added to the real CAD.
• Then, after machining, the part must be cleaned and polished and then, we can have some post-processing
treatments if required.
Figure 43.3: Additive manufacturing process chain.
Notice that it is not a net shape production (except for prototypes): AM doesn’t produce finished parts
since, for example in metal industries, post-processing operations are needed due to the importance of geometrical
and surface tolerances (obtained through subsequent processes).
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44 AM processes
In order to classified the work, 7 AM processes (ASTM standards) are defined and attempted to classify the different
techniques:
1. Vat photopolymerization (SLA, used called also as STL): processes that utilize a liquid photopolymer that is
contained in a vat and processed by selectively delivering energy to cure specific regions of a part cross-section;
2. Powder bed fusion (SLS/SLM): processes that utilize a container filled with powder that is processed selectively
using an energy source, most commonly a scanning laser or electron beam;
3. Material extrusion (FDM): processes that deposit a material by extruding it through a nozzle, typically while
scanning the nozzle in a pattern that produces a part cross-section;
4. Directed energy deposition (LENS or DED): processes that simultaneously deposit a material (usually powder
or wire) and provide energy to process that material through a single deposition device
5. Material jetting: ink-jet printing processes - droplets of build material are jetted to form an object;
6. Binder jetting: processes where a binder is printed into a powder bed in order to form part cross-sections;
7. Sheet lamination (LOM): sheets are bonded to form an object.
In the next chapters, there will be described all these processes except the last three since they aren’t anymore
commercially important or are commercially dead.
Moreover, another classification of the additive manufacturing processes is the technological classification, illus-
trated in the figure below.
Figure 44.1: Technological classification of AM processes.
44.1 Vat photopolymerization (SLA)

Stereolitography (SLA) is the first invented process that uses photopolymerization: this process makes use
of liquid, radiation curable resins, or photopolymers as their primary material. Most photopolymers react to
ultraviolet (UV) radiation and upon irradiation, these materials become solid through a chemical reaction, called
photopolymerization.
The system layout, shown in fig.44.2, used for stereolitography, is valid also for many other 3D techniques and
the type of the process is very similar to others one.
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Figure 44.2: Stereolitography system.
• There is a reservoir of liquid in which there is a platform that can go up and down.
• Through a laser beam, the surface is scanned and when the liquid is touched by the beam, polymerized.
• During this process, after each layer has been polymerized, this platform moves down of a distance equal to
the designed slice thickness.
• After this movement, a new layer goes on top of the previous one and through the heat provided by the laser
beam, the point under polymerization is allowed to weld to the solid material.
• Through this process, the part is built layer-by-layer
There are some process variant for SLA process, illustrated in figure 44.3:
1. Vector scan (or point-wise) approaches, used typically in most of the commercial SLA machines;
2. Mask projection (or layer-wise) approaches that irradiate entire layers at one time.
Figure 44.3: SLA process variants.
Respect to the first one, the second option is simpler and probably also faster since it projects light on an entire
region; through this method, it is possible to polymerize not only the point scanned but all the surface.
At the beginning, the products of this process are mainly prototypes but there are also other applications
(shown in fig.44.4) :
• In dental field, it represents the perfect example of mass customization (each dental plate is unique and
different from the others)
• Aesthetic prototypes
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• Plastic parts
The only limitation of SLA is related to the materials: they must be photo-polymerized and it represents a limit
on the strength. Since there is nothing that can be done to improve the strength, we can only change technology
using for example powder bed fusion.
Figure 44.4: Example of SLA applications.
44.2 Powder bed fusion (SLS/SLM)

44.2.1 Selective Laser Sintering (SLS)
Powder bed fusion (PBF) processes were among the first commercialized AM processes developed; then, the first
commercialized PBF was called Selective Laser Sintering (SLS).
SLS uses a high power laser (for example, a carbon dioxide) to fuse small particles of plastic, metal (direct metal
laser sintering), ceramic or glass powders into a mass that has a desired 3D shape. In this process, the phenomena
considered is sintering: it is a superficial melting due to laser beam of the outer skin of two grains. Since it melts
just the outer surface, sintering is a semisolid techniques and induces also a diffusion bonding process: atoms of one
material migrate to the other thanks to thermal excitation (as explain in chapter 12 for USM).
Figure 44.5: SLS system.
The process and the system, represented in fig.44.5, is very similar to the previous one:
• There is a tank full of powder, called powder bed.
• The powder material is a low-melting point material, like polymers, but also can be metal if the power of the
laser beam is increased high enough.
• A roller add material layer-by-layer after the previous one is melted.
• The elevator is moved down layer by layer, but in this case, we can only move it down.
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Since SLS can work with different material, this process is much flexible than the previous one (originally, it was
used just for plastic parts) and use for different applications, like aesthetics prototypes or plastic parts.
Figure 44.6: Example of SLS applications.
44.2.2 Selective Laser Melting (SLM)

Increasing the power of laser beam and reducing the scanning time, we obtain Selective Laser Melting (SLM)
process: in SLM, the powder particles are entirely melted, not only superficially as in sintering. Respect to
SLS, it works with metals and can obtain much better mechanical strength (comparable to the strength of casting
material).
As illustrated in fig.44.7, the particles have typically a round shape; due to this fact, there are chances that
some space remains after re-solidification between the grains and as a consequence, there could be the risk to have
a porosity problem.
Figure 44.7: SLM process.
Even if the final part is not completely dense, it presents a very low value of porosity (it is 96-99% fully dense)
that is comparable to the micro-porosity value in casting and so doesn’t represent a problem for many application.
Vice versa, for fatigue applications, porosity is a problem due to fatigue fractures since they start from micro-
porosity.
SLM is used for applications to realize metal parts with severe undercuts, as shown in figure44.8; the precision
that we can reach is very high but, on the other hand, it is very rough. This is a limitation of SLM since the final
part has to be polished but, when there are several undercuts, it isn’t possible to clean it and this is a huge problem.
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Figure 44.8: Example of SLM applications.
The material properties (illustrated in the figure below) are comparable with casting, even higher since the
melting and cooling processes are very fast: the material rapidly solidifies and so the part is tempered. So, as for
EBM, with SLM we have harder material.
Figure 44.9: Comparison between material properties obtaining through different processes.
44.3 Material extrusion (FDM)

Material extrusion is related to the processes that deposit a material by extruding it through a nozzle and it is also
called Fused Deposition Modeling (FDM).
44.3.1 FDM for plastic

It is the main process for rapidly prototyping techinques for plastic, much more used of stereolitography for consumer
or low cost products (like toys).
FDM machines are very cheap and economic since the principle of the process is very simple:
• a plastic wired is heated up a little bit (hundred degrees)
• it is extruded through a nozzle
• then, it is deposited over the platform or over the as-built material
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Figure 44.10: FDM system and process for plastic
The FDM machine is composed by:
• a scanning system that moves on X and Y directions

• a build platform, (i.e. an elevator) that can moves vertically (as seen for previous techniques)
• a filament of thermoplastic material, which is the build filament, that is extruded through a heated nozzle
• a second extruder (typically in the new FDM machines) for the support material filament which is weaker
respect the base plastic. Generally, it has a different color to clearly understand which is the support filament
and then remove it.
Notice that, at the end of the process, the part must be cleaned since there is the support filament (not a net shape
production).
Concerning the applications (some examples are shown in figure below), as we said before, FDM is, by far,
the most economic and diffused technology for the consumer market, realizing for example functional prototypes,
plastic parts or medical components (changing the material).
Figure 44.11: Examples of FDM applications.
44.3.2 FDM for metals and ceramics

Thanks to a recent development, FDM can be used also to work metal or ceramic parts through the deposition
of a “green” product. In powder metallurgy, “green” metal is a mix of metal powder and thermoplastic binder
components. The grains of metal or ceramic powders, that are mixed with pellets of thermoplastic resin, are fine
grains (< 10 µm), much smaller than SLM ones.
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Figure 44.12: FDM system for metals and ceramics.
Respect to traditional FDM, the only part that changes is the extrusion head: there is an extruder with a feeding
unit in which there is the mix made by plastic and metals. This head is fixed and only the platform (3-axis) can
be moved.
The process is made by some steps:
1. Feedstock preparation:
(a) Preparation starts buying or making the metal powder57 (can be also stainless steel, ceramic, tungsten
carbide, zirconium or many other powders) with the polymeric binder which is mostly made of wax and
some lubricant
(b) Powder and binder are mixed; typically, polymeric binder is < 40% in volume which means 6%
− 9% in
weight (i.e. metal powder > 90% in weight);
(c) These granules are then pellettised and the feedstock is made. In this case, there isn’t a filament as in
conventional FDM.
Figure 44.13: Feedstock preparation process.
2. Deposition by extrusion: a green (not fine) FDM part is obtained which means that it is a rough material
(we have to move then to brown part).
Figure 44.14: Examples of “green” FDM part.

57FDM can extrude any material that can be sintered.
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3. Debinding and sintering: a thermal cycle, shown in figure below, is used to move from the green FDM part
to the final part in order to make it useful.
(a) Solvent (water) debinding: green FDM part is put in water, that remove a part (15-20%) of the binder.
(b) Thermal debinding: depending on the material, the part is heated up to 600-900 °C to remove thermally
the binder. After this, all the plastic components are removed and brown part is obtained.
(c) Sintering in air or argon atmosphere: since we remove plastic components, we have a brown part extremely
fragile unless it maintains its geometry with a little bit shrinkage; in fact, due to debinding, the grains
collapse each others, they shrink, mix and stay together. So, the full metal final part is obtained through
sintering.
Figure 44.15: Debinding and sintering process.
Notice that, this last process is composed of intermediate phase where we can have defects.
Reasons to develop FDM for metal and ceramics are:
• Costs: even if it is much complicated respect to SLM, that lets to obtain better quality with one laser
1
operation, it cost less (∼ 10 of typical SLM cost).
• Productivity: respect 3D printing that can make just one part per time, this FDM technology can do more
parts per time; even if there are a lot of sub-sequence phases, these are at the bottom of the process (with
the “green” part).
• Deposition time: since in FDM we don’t have melting, we can go as faster as possible while, with thermal
machines (like lasers), there is the constrain given by the thermal cycle of the material.
As a consequence of the process, expected performance of sintered parts are:
• 10 times faster (less deposition time) and 10 times cheaper (it is the purpose of the FDM technology).
• Good hardness but the mechanical strength isn’t comparable with laser (as qualitative example, it is the half
in mechanical strength)
• Good final density (∼ 95% relative density) and surface finish due to shrinkage (residual porosities form 1 to
6% within each road)
• Good welding among overlapped roads
• Due to shrinkage, there isn’t a surface finished issue that it is used to have in SLM part and the outer loop
is braided and better
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Figure 44.16: Expected performance of sintered parts.
44.4 Directed energy deposition (DED)

Directed energy deposition (DED) processes are used primarily to add features to an existing structure or to repair
damaged or worn parts, as told in the chapter 28.3 about laser cladding. The process uses a laser (or electron)
beam, a powder stream and a shield gas:
• The laser beam is focused to a spot and the powder stream immediately melts at the focus due to the laser.
• A melt pool is formed on a metallic substrate with the laser beam and the melt powder grains are added to
the material, also thanks to a shield gas that projected them on the surface.
• The process is repeated layer after layer and so that an additive process (like 3D printing) is obtained.
Figure 44.17: Directed energy deposition process.
Notice that post-deposition heat treatment may be required and a final machining is required to achieve the
right geometric tolerance.
Respect to STL, the main advantage is the saved cost on the material: since there isn’t a powder bag, only
the selected powder needed is melt and as a consequence, it is removed any waste of powder. On the contrary, in
selected laser melting, we have to expend more material to build the part and due to this fact, it is more expensive
(metal powder cost much more then rough material). Moreover, in DED processes, there isn’t the problem of
pollutants or oxides.
As a consequence, DED processes are also more flexible since doesn’t required a bag.
Interesting machine is LASERTEC 65 3D in which it is possible to do, at the same time, DED and machining
(i.e. milling) and it is a so called hybrid operation that can be perform. Even if it takes a very long time (for
example, 230 min. for DED, 76 for milling), it is good for low batch size and since no tool is required, it might be
economically good.
Note that another advantage is that this is a 5 axis machine and can compensate problems of steep, obtaining
a better quality.
206
Figure 44.18: 5-axis hybrid machine.
44.5 Comparison
In the follow figure, it is illustrated a comparison between the AM process categories and feedstock materials.
Figure 44.19: Comparison between categories and materials.
• Vat photopolymerization works only with photopolymers (with some issues also ceramic materials);
• Material jetting works only with polymers;

• Binder jetting and powder bed fusion work with more materials since they are more material flexible;
• Material extrusion for thermoplastic polymers and, if invented FDM works, also for metals and ceramic
materials.
207
45 Design rules for AM
Although AM process is generally considered capable of producing parts with high geometrical complexity, still
many limitations must be considered when designing the part and the process:
• Maximum allowed overhang
• Presence of thermal stresses and/or distortions

Part orientation and supports are crucial in order to have a correct AM operation.
Supports Supports are needed for very long hangouts that constrains and compensates the distortion of the
material due to the bending effect in order to obtain the designed shape. In fact, there is the risk of distortions due
to:
• gravity when material is cooling down (as in stereolitography)

• thermal stresses, as occurs in SLM: in this case, the material solidifies immediatly but bends due to thermal
effect (not gravity effect).
The material due to this effects can bend upward or downward (as shown in fig.45.1). Notice that this is true not
only for laser based processes but for all AM processes (FDM parts, 3D printing parts,..).
Supports can be done of different material (es. anchors) or can have the same material, as used in SLM. In this
case, support has to be thin enough to be removed.
Figure 45.1: Distortions and supports for AM processes.
Inclination problems Especially for FDM and stereolitography, there is a problem when steep walls are built.
In fact, for low angles (as example< 45°58) of walls, the inclination can generate some distortions and bad surface
quality; with not vertical walls, there are mainly two problems:
1. Bending, that require additional supports;
2. Staircase effects: layer by layer, the external melt material can create droplets and generate bubbles; this
factor creates an irregular shape and as a consequence, the surface quality can be different in this “stair”
region, according to the technology.
A method to avoid this problem is to use a 5 axis machine as the hybrid process machine LASERTEC 65 3D, as
said before.
58The actual minimum angle depends on material and technology
208
Figure 45.2: Staircase effect and support for steep walls.
45.1 Part quality issues

During AM processes some problems concerning the quality can occur:
• Main micro-concerns:
– Porosities between single roads, due to shrinkage or to the deposition technique
– Outer surface roughness: Ra can be larger than 12 µm for several AM processes
• Main macro-concerns:
– Staircase effect on the surface, due to slicing, especially relevant for oblique walls
– Macro-mechanical properties
– Geometrical tolerances
In order to remove some of these problem, some post-processing activities are very often required:
• 5 axes machining for improving geometrical tolerances
• Hot Isostatic Pressing (HIP) for improving densification: it is a process to densify powders or cast and sintered
parts in a furnace at high pressure and high temperature (as example, 900-1250 °C for steels and superalloys);
the gas pressure acts uniformly in all directions to provide isotropic properties and 100% densification.
• ECM deburring/finishing or tumble finishing (as shown in figure below) to improve surface roughness.
Figure 45.3: Example of tumble finishing.
In conclusion, remarks the fact that the general idea is that AM costs are convenient at low batches and are
insensitive to the volumes, but part complixity must be taken into account too.
209

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Mechanical Engineering Master

ADVANCED MANUFACTURING PROCESSES

8 Sheet Hydroforming (SHF) 54

III Ultrasonic machining process 60

11 Rotary ultrasonic machining 68

14 Tool life model 75

15 Tools and solutions for machining 78

V High performance in Machine Tools 80

21 Laser operation mechanism 91

22 Thermal model 100

23 Laser-material interaction 106

24 Methods of laser cutting 109

25 Laser cutting process and quality parameters 117

26 Laser sources 123

27 Laser welding 131

VII Plasma Arc Cutting 146

31 High Definition Plasma (HDP) 156

32 Process parameters 162

33 Cutting quality 166

VIII Electric Discharge Machine 178

36 Electric circuits 180

39 Dielectric fluid 191

41 WIRE EDM 193

42MICRO EDM 195

IX Introduction to Additive Manufacturing processes 196

45 Design rules for AM 208

4. Abrasive feeding system (AWJ), represented in Fig.1.20;

5. Cutting heads (strictly connected with point 4);

1.1 Water treatment system

There are 3 reasons related to the damage of these components:

1.2 Pumping system

Pwater · Swater = Poil · Soil

Figure 1.2: Forces balance of two kinds of intensifiers.

1.2.2 Direct drive intensifier

Figure 1.4: Schematic drawing of a direct pump.

1.2.3 Double acting intensifier

Figure 1.5: Schematic drawing of a double acting intensifier.

• Single acting intensifier with two active stroke per cycle2;

– Low pressure circuit (orange): typical maximum pressure ∼ 20 MPa;

Figure 1.7: Example of a pumping system with double action intensifier.

In Fig.1.73, it is possible to see the water accumulator:

1.2.4 Single acting intensifier

Figure 1.10: Scheme of single acting intensifier.

1.2.5 Other possible intensifier solutions

1.3 HP water transport system and connections

Figure 1.13: Gradient of pressure and residual stress after autofrettage.

Figure 1.15: Spirals for cutting head movement.

1.4 Abrasive feeding system

Figure 1.18: Example of discrete off-line calibration.

• it is less expensive because it is a natural material;

– SiO2(silicium oxide): main component about 36%;

Figure 1.19: Distribution of particle size for a vine nominal mesh #.

1.5 Cutting heads

Figure 1.20: Types of WaterJet systems

1.5.1 Cutting head for Pure Water Jet (PWJ)

Figure 1.21: Applications and scheme of PWJ.

Figure 1.22: Orifice inserts and wear process.

1.5.2 Cutting head for Abrasive Water Jet (AWJ)

• Focuser diameter: 1 mm;

• Abrasive size 170 µm;

Mixing chamber, builds by two components:

Figure 1.24: Wear components and scheme of AWJ.

Figure 1.25: Wear in mixing tube.