Refractive beam shapers for material processing with high power single mode and multimode lasers

Abstract

The high power multimode fiber-coupled laser sources, like solid state lasers or laser diodes as well as single mode and multimode fiber lasers, are now widely used in various industrial laser material processing technologies like metal or plastics welding, cladding, hardening, brazing, annealing. Performance of these technologies can be essentially improved by varying the irradiance profile of a laser beam with using beam shaping optics, for example, the field mapping refractive beam shapers like piShaper. Operational principle of these devices presumes transformation of laser beam irradiance distribution from Gaussian to flattop, super-Gauss, or inverse-Gauss profile with high flatness of output wave front, conserving of beam consistency, providing collimated output beam of low divergence, high transmittance, extended depth of field. Important feature of piShaper is in capability to operate with TEM 00 and multimode lasers, the beam shapers can be implemented not only as telescopic optics but also as collimating systems, which can be connected directly to fiber-coupled lasers or fiber lasers, thus combining functions of beam collimation and irradiance transformation. This paper will describe some features of beam shaping of high-power laser sources, including multimode fiber coupled lasers, and ways of adaptation of beam shaping optical systems design to meet requirements of modern laser technologies. Examples of real implementations will be presented as well.