Experimental and theoretical investigation of the drilling of alumina ceramic using Nd:YAG pulsed laser

Alumina ceramics have found wide range of applications from semiconductors, communication technologies, medical devices, automotive to aerospace industries. Processing of alumina ceramics is rather difficult due to its high degree of brittleness, hardness, low thermal diffusivity and conductivity. Rapid improvements in laser technologies in recent years make the laser among the most convenient processing tools for difficult-to-machine materials such as hardened metals, ceramics and composites. This is particularly evident as lasers have become an inexpensive and controllable alternative to conventional hole drilling methods. This paper reports theoretical and experimental results of drilling the alumina ceramic with thicknesses of 5 mm and 10.5 mm using milisecond pulsed Nd:YAG laser. Effects of the laser peak power, pulse duration, repetition rate and focal plane position have been determined using optical and Scanning Electron Microscopy (SEM) images taken from cross-sections of the drilled alumina ceramic samples. In addition to dimensional analysis of the samples, microstructural investigations have also been examined. It has been observed that, the depth of the crater can be controlled as a function of the peak power and the pulse duration for a single laser pulse application without any defect. Crater depth can be increased by increasing the number of laser pulses with some defects. In addition to experimental work, conditions have been simulated using ANYS FLUENT package providing results, which are in good agreement with the experimental results. (C) 2011 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.