What makes this application special is that a very small character height of only 0.020” (0.5 mm) was required in order to fit the four-digit text string onto the 0.108“ (2.7 mm) wide LED body. To accomplish this, we fit an 80 mm focusing lens to an FH Series marking head and 10 W sealed CO₂ laser. The 80 mm lens provides a 116-micron (0.005”) spot size with a 0.8 mm (0.032”) depth of focus. Using our WinMark Pro laser marking software, we created a four-digit text object with one of WinMark Pro’s built-in stroke fonts. Text Height was set to 0.02” with 0.015” Extra Character Spacing. Laser power was set to 6 watts, Velocity to 15 inches per second, and Resolution to 750. Cycle time for this very small mark is a fast 60 milliseconds (0.06 seconds).

Cutting Automotive Door Steel

The power of Synrad’s new Firestar f400 400-watt laser opens the door, both literally and figuratively, to new applications in the automotive industry. The f400’s best-in-class mode quality of TEM₀₀, 98% purity and beam quality of M² <1.1 ±0.1 provides a higher delivered power density than many competing 500 watt lasers.

This piece of 0.0725” (1.84 mm) thick steel for an automotive door component was cut with our f400 laser. Note that the cut edge is clean with no underside dross, which eliminates the need for any post processing deburring.

Our XY cutting setup focused the 400 watt CO₂ beam through a 2.5” positive meniscus lens, providing a 0.004” (100 micron) focused spot with a 0.07” (1.8 mm) depth of focus. Using 80 PSI of oxygen assist gas, we cut through the 0.0725” thick piece of steel at a speed of 90 inches per minute.

 In addition to a clean, burr-free edge, lasers provide a much narrower cut width, or kerf, than competing cutting methods. The parameters used for this application typically provide a kerf measuring only 0.0045” (0.1 mm) wide.