SPI Lasers Investigates New Applications for the Fiber Laser

10th December 2007, Santa Clara, California, SPI Lasers Applications Laboratory today announced that work conducted at the applications facility managed by Dr. Tony Hoult is challenging the perception of the capabilities of near infra red lasers using state-of-art fiber lasers. Areas such as plastic welding for the medical and mobile phone industries, scribing and cutting polymers for the automotive industry and ablation of thin films for the photovoltaic industry are showing excellent results when processed with a fiber laser. SPI is expecting more results for the fiber laser in the near future as SPI is asking for more organisations to come forward with further challenges for the fiber laser.

One of the most recent examples of the more surprising results produced by the Applications Lab is Plastic Welding. The welding of plastics was not thought to be suitable for either the high brightness of fiber lasers or the beam characteristics. However, when tested by the Applications Lab, a careful manipulation of the laser beam has made it very easy to produce welds in polymers that are efficient, precise and time saving. These types of plastic welds are commonly produced for the medical and mobile phone industries.