10 Things You Can Do With Your Laser

Laser cutting techniques are becoming increasingly important to the manufacturing process. This is because lasers are very precise, allowing manufacturers to quickly produce cuts and etchings with a speed and precision that would otherwise be impossible. Used mostly in industrial manufacturing, laser cutting machines works by using a powerful laser to cut or etch substances. Depending on the materials being used, and the kind of laser equipment, the material is either vaporized, blown away by jets of gas or burned, leaving behind a precisely cut edge, bore or etching. Using lasers not only increases the speed of cutting in most circumstances, but also affords manufacturers the ability to have really consistent results, because a laser does not wear out or maintain prolonged contact with the material being cut, like most standard cutting and etching tools do. And this is just the beginning. Here are ten more things that lasers can do:

- Laser Cutting can be used to cut various materials with a high degree of precision, from sheet metal to wood, wax, plastics and ceramics.

- Laser cutters do not use cutting blades and therefore won't need to be replaced with time. Because of this you can use the laser as often as you wish with little maintenance and no reduction in quality.

- Because of the high degree of precision involved with laser cutting, you can easily cut materials that would otherwise be hard to work with.

- As the laser is so accurate and has such a small area of effect, you can cut materials without warping the surrounding material in any way. When held up against some other heat-cutting techniques, a laser's heat is very concentrated, preventing it from affecting the material around the cut.

- Materials that do not melt, for instance certain there most thing plastics, carbon and wood, can be laser cut with a vaporization process. This ensures that any waste material will be vaporized, effectively eliminating it.

- With laser cutting, you can create cuts, boring s, and etchings to very fine tolerances. Modern laser cutters can be positioned accurately to tolerances of five to ten micrometers. A micrometer is less than the width of a human hair.

- Laser cutting machines are usually pretty simple to use, in and of themselves, and don't demand a a lot of skill or training. Most suppliers of laser cutting machines will give you what training is needed.

- Laser cutting tools allow you to significantly reduce clean up time and effort, as they produce far less waste material than machine cutters. Wood is cut without sawdust, metal is cut without shavings. In most cases, the small amounts of material waste can be picked up with a common shop vac.

- Laser cutting machines can be used to create much the same effects as an oxygen torch but with greater consistency and precision. This is known as 'reactive cutting' and is often used with steel that is more than one millimeter thick.

- Laser cutting tools may be used to crack heat-sensitive materials in a controlled way. Often used when working with glass, the process allows the manufacturer to control and move the crack to suit production needs.

By: Maarc Anderes

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Marc Anderes is a co-founder of Maloya Laser that is dedicated to Metal Manufacturing and Laser Cutting with state-of-the-art laser systems, servicing aerospace, medical, machinery, scientific and transportation requirements.