Fast and innovative determination of parameters for steel hardening with high power diode lasers

Laser Beam Hardening with High Power Diode Lasers is presented as an excellent method for local heat treatment and minimum distortion. An overview is given about several strategies for local heat treatment and different industrial applications. Precise measuring and controlling of the surface temperature makes the process very reliable and is an essantial tool for industrial users. To keep a constant penetration of the hardening zone at constant surface temperatures the feed rate can be adapted to local heat flow conditions. A former postprocessor of Fraunhofer IWS generates a CNC-program for the treatment and changes the feed rate in dependence of the surface shape. The new processor additionally considers local heat flow variations of a part caused by boreholes, grooves and changing local thickness. The processing is very fast and can be applied for solving daily problems of laser beam hardening. Some examples show the performance of the new postprocessor.