Automatic condition setting of materials processing CO2 laser

Abstract

Laser cutting is a thermal cutting method that uses a high-energy density heat source for processing and allows processing to be carried out at a high speed and high precision. Therefore, laser cutting is used as a means to process sheet metal such as mild steel or stainless steel at a high precision. However, in recent years, as the thickness of the workpiece is tending to increase, and as the target of processing machine operates has increased due to the diffusion of laser processing machines in a wide range of applications, focus has been turned to the difficulty of setting the processing conditions. In other words, the processing conditions of some shapes which are difficult to process have become dominant in the setting of conditions of outward form, and by that is causing the processing efficiency to drop. For example, when processing thick plates of mild steel, it is difficult to set the conditions that prevent defects at the cutting start position after piercing (drilling the processing start section), defects in small hole processing, and defects when processing edges. Furthermore, when one operator simultaneously operates multiple processing machines, there is a need to reduce the time required to find the conditions. Even when processing machines are newly introduced, there are many cases when a high operation rate is required immediately after the processing machine is introduced.Laser cutting is a thermal cutting method that uses a high-energy density heat source for processing and allows processing to be carried out at a high speed and high precision. Therefore, laser cutting is used as a means to process sheet metal such as mild steel or stainless steel at a high precision. However, in recent years, as the thickness of the workpiece is tending to increase, and as the target of processing machine operates has increased due to the diffusion of laser processing machines in a wide range of applications, focus has been turned to the difficulty of setting the processing conditions. In other words, the processing conditions of some shapes which are difficult to process have become dominant in the setting of conditions of outward form, and by that is causing the processing efficiency to drop. For example, when processing thick plates of mild steel, it is difficult to set the conditions that prevent defects at the cutting start position after piercing (drilling the processing start sect...