Author : John Dowden Year : 2001
The initial aim of this book is to describe the physical principles that need to be taken into account in modeling various aspects of laser material processing, and to formulate them in mathematical terms. The main purpose, however, is to show the way in which they can then be used to obtain insight into a number of processes by the construction of simple models whose underlying principles are easy to see.
The immediate applications of the general principles considered here are welding, surface treatment, drilling, forming, and cutting, but the general principles have a very wide application. Many aspects of the theory are relatively independent of the material under study, which could be a simple metal, a complicated alloy (such as those used in the aerospace industry), concrete, or plastic. Although all the examples considered in this book have the common feature that the source of power is a laser, and the power of the laser is relatively high, the principles and methods are very general and apply to thermal modeling in many different fields, from micro technology to laser medicine.
