Switch power supply of fast axial flow CO 2 laser for complex machining

Abstract

FAF(Fast Axial Flow) CO₂ lasers are widely used in the areas of welding, cutting and texturing etc. These applications require the laser power supply with higher performance. In the paper, a switch power supply for the FAF CO₂ laser was developed, which can provide continuous and pulsed discharge voltage. It makes a FAF CO₂ laser to be competent for complex machining. The switch power supply adopts the half-bridge resonant switching circuit. IGBT was adopted as the switch device, which integrates the drive circuit and protection circuit. A microchip was used in the power as the control core, which translates the control signal from users to corresponding driving signal for IGBT, gathers and deals with the faults of the switch power supply. The experiment of the switch power supply was made on a fast axial flow CO₂ laser. The experiments show that the switch power supply can work on the FAF CO₂ laser well. The discharge current can be adjusted from 5mA to 120mA. It can switch the discharge freely between continuous mode and pulse mode. The pulse frequency can be adjusted from 20 to 2000Hz. Utilizing the switching power supply, the efficiency of the laser was improved. The dissipation power of the IGBT is very small, and the power supply brings fewer high frequency harmonic, lower interference.