Study of CWNd-Yag laser welding of Zn-coated steel sheets

The welding of Zn-coated steel thin sheets is a great challenge for the automotive industry. Previous studies have defined the main physical processes involved. For non-controlled conditions, the zinc vapour expelled from the interface of the two sheets violently expands inside the keyhole and expels the melt pool. When using CO2 lasers, we have previously shown that an elongated laser spot produces an elongated keyhole, which is efficient for suppressing this effect. We have adopted a similar approach for CW Nd:Yag laser welding and we observe that an elongated spot is not necessary for achieving good weld seams. Several diagnostics were used in order to understand these interesting results. High-speed video camera visualizations of the top and the bottom of the keyhole during the process show the dynamics of the keyhole hydrodynamic behaviour. It appears that the role of the reflected beam on the front keyhole wall for generating a characteristic rear wall deformation is crucial for an efficient stabilization of the process. Our dynamic keyhole modelling, which includes ray tracing totally confirms this interpretation and explains the results for very different experimental conditions (effect of welding speed, laser intensity, variable sheet thickness, laser beam intensity distribution) that will be presented.