Overview of hybrid technology

Abstract

A laser beam is still a relatively expensive energy source. Therefore, hybrid processes are getting more and more popular. The word “hybrid” is derived from the Latin and means “mixing or putting things together from different sources”. The laser hybrid welding and cladding process describes the combination of the laser process and a conventional process to a new one. The first laser hybrid process was the laser oxygen cutting which is a combination of laser energy and a chemical energy coming from an exothermal reaction of the oxygen with the heated steel. The first known laser hybrid welding process was an arc process stabilized by a laser (M. Eboo et. al. 1978); the first laser welding process supported by or combined with an arc jet was presented by E. Beyer et. al. at the ICALEO Conference in 1994. Since that time different papers in laser arc and laser plasma hybrid welding have been presented by Fraunhofer followed by laser induction welding and cladding process. This process has been running in production for years now.The latest laser hybrid processes are the combination of CO2, Nd:YAG lasers or diode lasers and plasma spraying or plasma cladding. These processes were first presented at the Diode Laser Workshop in Dresden in 1999. The Fraunhofer-Gesellschaft took out patents on these processes as well.The interest in hybrid process technologies is demonstrated in the high number of papers presented e. at WLT-Conference “Lasers in Manufacturing” in Munich and at the past years’ ICALEO Conferences [1 - 12].A laser beam is still a relatively expensive energy source. Therefore, hybrid processes are getting more and more popular. The word “hybrid” is derived from the Latin and means “mixing or putting things together from different sources”. The laser hybrid welding and cladding process describes the combination of the laser process and a conventional process to a new one. The first laser hybrid process was the laser oxygen cutting which is a combination of laser energy and a chemical energy coming from an exothermal reaction of the oxygen with the heated steel. The first known laser hybrid welding process was an arc process stabilized by a laser (M. Eboo et. al. 1978); the first laser welding process supported by or combined with an arc jet was presented by E. Beyer et. al. at the ICALEO Conference in 1994. Since that time different papers in laser arc and laser plasma hybrid welding have been presented by Fraunhofer followed by laser induction welding and cladding process. This process has been running in pr...