Laser cleaning is an environmentally friendly process used to remove rust, paint, oxides, and other contaminants from metal surfaces. Due to its efficiency, it is used in an increasing number of applications. Laser cleaning requires a pulsed fiber laser (usually 50 watts or higher). Traditional industrial cleaning methods are often considered tedious (and for good reason). Rust removal can be time-consuming and laborious. Oxide removal can involve harmful chemicals specific to each material that needs to be removed. In some cases, removing paint by sandblasting can damage the underlying metal. Treating these issues is often costly, but laser cleaning is changing that: it’s a cost-effective solution that reduces cleaning time and maintenance. Laser cleaning solutions can overcome many of the problems faced by rust removal and other industrial cleaning applications. By selecting the specific material to be removed, fiber lasers provide a fast and set-and-forget solution for many industries.

1. All materials have an ablation threshold

Laser ablation occurs when a laser beam is used to remove layers or coatings of material. This is the process behind all laser cleaning applications. Laser rust removal of steel. When the beam hits the surface, the molecular bonds in the dust or rust layer are broken and ejected from the substrate. In less technical terms, you can imagine that the layer to be removed is simply evaporated away by a laser beam. A simple way to grasp the importance of the ablation threshold is to compare it to throwing a ball through a wall. If you don’t throw it high enough, it will never fly to the other side. Even if you throw the ball a thousand times, you will always fail. The same applies to laser rust removal. You can fire a laser beam a thousand times, but as long as the energy is below the ablation threshold of the material you’re working with, nothing will be removed. Now, each material has different properties and therefore different molecular bonds. In other words, each material has a specific ablation threshold. In order to successfully remove a layer from a given material, the energy delivered by the laser beam must be above the ablation threshold of that particular material.

2. Material can be removed in a highly selective manner

Let’s continue our analogy. Imagine that there is a second, higher wall behind the first wall, and a ball is thrown with just enough energy to get it over the first wall, but not enough to get it over the second wall. The ball will bounce off the second wall and fall between the two walls. Once again, no matter how many times you throw the ball, you’ll always get the same result. You’ll get past the first wall, but never the second wall. Since each material has an ablation threshold, laser cleaning can differentiate between two or more materials when trying to remove unwanted layers from an object. Given a sufficiently large difference in ablation thresholds between materials, it is possible to select which material to remove (i.e., the material with a lower ablation threshold) while leaving other materials unaffected. For example, rust removal thresholds are much lower than those for common metals like steel and aluminum. The same goes for paints and oils. The large gap between the two values allows contaminants and coatings to completely evaporate without damaging the underlying substrate. There just isn’t enough energy to do damage.

3. Powerful yet short burst means faster removal

You can think of laser ablation as similar to carving stone with a hammer and chisel. You can use a small hammer to make many small taps on your chisel. Alternatively, you can use a larger hammer to harness more force, thereby reducing the number of blows required and increasing the speed of removal. The idea is the same as laser cleaning, except you only want to remove one layer of material: contaminants. Fiber laser cleaning systems can remove any given layer using two different methods. Laser beams are either continuous light waves or pulsed at a given repetition rate. Even though the results are nearly identical, deletion speeds vary depending on the method. For a given surface area, putting the same amount of energy into a short pulse increases the power. It’s like using a bigger hammer. Pulsed laser beams are more efficient than continuous beams and provide faster removal rates. While short laser pulses clean surfaces faster, they also ensure the underlying material doesn’t overheat.

4. No consumables and environmentally friendly

Since this cleaning method only uses a laser beam to evaporate the layer being removed, there are virtually no consumables. That’s the beauty of lasers, just set up the power plug and you’re ready to go. Importantly, lasers do not use chemical products or solvents. This makes laser surface cleaning one of the safe solutions when removing rust and coatings. Not only is there no chemical waste to dispose of, but employees are completely safe when working near laser cleaning machines that meet international laser safety standards. Employees don’t need personal protective equipment and don’t have to deal with those nasty chemicals. That being said, since laser cleaning vaporizes materials into smoke, you should install a smoke extraction system near the laser to ensure that no paint, oil, or dust particles are released into the air.

5. Laser cleaning is of interest to a variety of industrial applications

Removing burnt rubber residue from tire molds; giving new life to old pipes; cleaning pipes at nuclear power plants; and even larger projects, such as removing paint from rusty bridges and preparing surfaces for welding, are all possible from industrial laser cleaning projects that benefit. This non-contact cleaning technology can be used in countless industrial applications. The only limitation is the ability to differentiate between the material to be removed and the material to be protected. Currently, common laser cleaning applications include welding pre-treatment to remove rust and other contaminants from welding areas; post-welding treatment to remove oxides from aluminum and stainless steel; laser surface treatment to maximize paint adhesion; from specialty alloys Laser removal of oxides from ingots; removal of coatings immediately after coating processes to replace partial masking in production lines; stripping of parts scrapped due to paint defects; laser ablation is not only used for cleaning but is also widely used in other industries application.