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2003
Conference Paper
Titel
Laser-assisted forming of metallic micro-parts
Abstract
Modern metal forming technologies enable the mass-production of smallest parts for micro-technical applications. The future trend is to manufacture more complex parts at a high level of economic efficiency and precision. A common method to enhance the geometrical complexity of micro parts is the preheating of the workpiece. Conventional preheating processes are time cosuming, decrease the productivity and heat the complete workpiece, which can be disadvantageous in processes like deep-drawing. By a direct heating with laser radiation the temperature of local regions of the work piece can be increased quickly and the achievable process limits can be extended. Transparent tool parts made of sapphire permit the guidance of the laser radiation directly onto the workpiece within the closed tool during the process. This means no further preheating step and the avoidance of an extended total process time. In this paper applications of this technology in deep-drawing and can-extrusion processes as well as possibilities for theoretical predictions of dominating phenomena are discussed.