Scalable blue laser system architecture

This paper presents the results of welding tests performed with a 1kW blue laser to determine the power and spot characteristics necessary to be able to perform all the welds required in a battery and battery pack. The results of this study indicate that a minimum of 1,500 Watts with a nominal beam parameter product of 11 mm-mrad is required to interface with a scanner and achieve all of the welds required by this application. Several other key industrial applications are discussed, and the welding performance is characterized for various materials. These results are used to define the optimum laser system parameters to serve a broad range of applications. A new blue laser product architecture is presented that is capable of scaling to multi-kW power levels in order to meet the target performance. The building block for this architecture is a 400-Watt blue laser module. These units can be combined to produce systems of any power level in 400- Watt increments with excellent beam quality. The 1,500-Watt product being developed has a beam parameter product of less than 17 mm-mrad.