Mechanism study on the effects of side assisting gas velocity during CO₂ laser welding process

An experimental study on the effects of side assisting gas during CO ₂ laser welding has been carried out, and it is found that side assisting gas velocity can significantly affect the laser induced plasma and the weld cross-sectional geometry. In order to get better understanding on the associated mechanism, a three dimensional model based on the conservation laws of mass, momentum, and energy has been developed to simulate the spatial distributions of plasma temperature under different side assisting gas velocities. Furthermore, ray-tracing method is employed to investigate the variation of bremsstrahlung absorption and power density distribution on keyhole walls at different side assisting gas velocities with the assumption of conical keyhole shape. The results show that the diminishing of refraction and bremsstrahlung absorption due to an increase in side assisting gas velocity results in an increase in heat transfer efficiency, which contributes to the increase of weld cross-sectional area and penetration depth.